Recency illusion

The recency illusion is the belief or impression that a word or language usage is of recent origin when it is long-established.

The term was invented by Arnold Zwicky, a linguist at Stanford University who was primarily interested in examples involving words, meanings, phrases, and grammatical constructions.^[1]

However, use of the term is not restricted to linguistic phenomena: Zwicky has defined it simply as, "the belief that things you have noticed only recently are in fact recent".^[2]

Linguistic items prone to the Recency Illusion include:

• "Singular they": the use of they, them, or their to reference a singular antecedent without specific gender, as in someone said they liked the play. Although this usage is often cited as a modern invention, it is quite old.^[3] The usage is found, for example, in Shakespeare.^[4]
• The phrase between you and I (rather than between you and me), often viewed today as a hypercorrection, which could also be found occasionally in Early Modern English.^[3]
• The intensifier really as in it was a really wonderful experience, and the moderating adverb pretty as in it was a pretty exciting experience: many people have the impression that these usages are somewhat slang-like, and have developed relatively recently. They go back to at least the 18th century, and are commonly found in the works and letters of such writers as Benjamin Franklin.
• "Literally" being used in place of words like "figuratively" or "really" is often viewed as a recent change, but in fact usage dates back to the 1760s. ^[5]
• "Aks" as a production of African American English only. Use of "aks" in place of "ask" dates back to the works of Chaucer in Middle English, though typically in this context spelled "ax".^[6]
• The word "recency" itself. It is commonly used in consumer marketing ("analyze the recency of customer visits")^[7] and many think it was coined for that purpose. But its first known use was in 1612.^[8]

According to Zwicky, the illusion is caused by selective attention.^[2]

See also

• Frequency illusion

References

1. Rickford, John R.; Wasow, Thomas; Zwicky, Arnold (2007). "Intensive and quotative all: something new, something old". American Speech. 82 (1): 3–31. doi:10.1215/00031283-2007-001.
2. Zwicky, Arnold (7 August 2005). "Just between Dr. Language and I". Language Log. Retrieved 5 May 2015.
3. Merriam Webster's Dictionary of English Usage. Merriam Webster. 1989.
4. Shakespeare, William (1594). "Act IV, Scene 3". The Comedy of Errors. There's not a man I meet but doth salute me / As if I were their well-acquainted friend
5. Zimmer, Benjamin. "Literally: a history". Language Log.
6. Lippi-Green, Rosina (1997). English with an Accent: Language, Ideology, and Discrimination in the United States (2nd ed.). London: Routledge. ISBN 9780415559102.
7. root (14 February 2011). "Recency, Frequency, Monetary Value (RFM) Definition". Investopedia.
8. "recency". Merriam-Webster Dictionary.

Further reading

• Zwicky, Arnold (17 November 2007). "The word: Recency illusion". New Scientist. 196 (2630): 60. (subscription required (help)).