Sixty per cent of all had had periods of
spontaneously trying to select their vocabulary by making lists,
studying the dictionary, etc. The age of those who did so would seem
to average not far from early puberty, but the data are too meager for
conclusion. A few started to go through the dictionary, some wished to
astonish their companions or used large new words to themselves or
their dolls. Seventy percent had had a passion for affecting foreign
words when English would do as well. Conradi says "the age varies from
twelve to eighteen, most being fourteen to sixteen." Some indulge this
tendency in letters, and would like to do so in conversation, but fear
ridicule. Fifty-six per cent reported cases of superfine elegance or
affected primness or precision in the use of words. Some had spells of
effort in this direction, some belabor compositions to get a style
that suits them, some memorise fine passages to this end, or modulate
their voices to aid them, affect elegance with a chosen mate by
agreement soliloquize before a glass with poses. According to his
curve this tendency culminates at fourteen.
Adjectivism, adverbism, and nounism, or marked disposition to multiply
one or more of the above classes of words, and in the above order,
also occur near the early teens.
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