Degree complement

Degree complements, also known as "complements of degree" in English, are 程度补语 (literally, "degree complement") in Chinese. While most complements follow verbs, degree complements very often follow adjectives. They intensify or in some other way modify the degree of expression of the adjective (or verb).

Structure of Degree Complements

Degree complements can modify both verbs and adjectives, but remember, they always come after the word they modify. The chart below illustrates the structural pattern you should expect to see with degree complements. Note that the structural particle 得 is used in many cases, but not in every case.

Word Preceding Complement	Particle	Degree Complement	Example
Verb	得	很好	说得很好
	得	不好	说得不好
	得	很对	说得很对
	得	不多	说得不多
Adjective	得	很	好得很
	得	不得了	坏得不得了
		极了	好极了
		死了	累死了

When to Use Degree Complements

Until now, you may have probably been getting by just fine modifying your verbs with adverbs. You can use 非常 to say "very" and all that. Great. But once you learn to use degree complements, a whole new layer of expressiveness is infused into your language. You will be able to express degree of verbs and adjectives with much more precision and color. But how do you know when to use the degree complement? Here are the main reasons to use it:

To express how a verb happened or assess its quality
To express to what extent (or degree) an adjective is true

For the first case, the most typical examples would be describing how well an action is done, or in asking how well an action is done:

他做 得很好 。The complement tells us that "he did it well."
他做 得很差 。The complement tells us that "he did it poorly."
他做 得怎么样 ？The complement is used to ask "how he did it."

For the second case, instead of using the good old standby adverbs 很 and 非常, we can use all kinds of degree complements to spice up our adjective. In this case, the sample sentences below are going to revolve around how fat a cat is.

猫胖 得很 。The complement tells us that "the cat is very fat."
猫胖 得不得了 。The complement tells us that "the cat is terribly fat."
猫胖死了。The complement tells us that "the cat is fat to death" (but the cat didn't die; this is an exaggeration expressing the cat is very fat).

You may have noticed that some of those English translations are a little awkward. That's because the degree complement is a structure unique to Chinese which does not occur in English. Although "to death" works in same cases as a direct translation of the complement 死了, it's pretty unusual here. As for the other two translations, we would use similar ones if we had just used regular adverbs.

Below we will illustrate both cases further, starting with simple examples, and slowly building in complexity.

Common Degree Complements

Simple Degree Complements Following Verbs

The following sentences are are rather simple; they illustrate the various types of degree complements that can follow verbs, but without complicating the issue by also giving the verb an object.

他说 得很快 。He speaks quickly.
她说 得非常好 。She speaks very well.
他解释 得很清楚 。He understands clearly.
她穿 得比较难看 。The way she dresses is rather ugly.
她长 得不怎么样 。She grew up to be unattractive.
这个人跳 得特别高 。This person jumps especially high.
你怎么想 得这么复杂 ？How do you think so complexly?
还好你走 得慢 。Well, you walk slowly.
她做 得好不好 ？Did she do it well?
你们表现 得不错 。You guys performed pretty well.

Verbs with Degree Complements and Objects

The next group of examples are very similar to the last group, but this time the verbs involved also have objects. Adding a verb to an object complicates a sentence in Mandarin, because a single verb cannot be followed by both an object and a complement. In order to express that kind of sentence, there are two approaches to take^[1]:

Method #1: Repeat the verb, following it first with the object, and then with the complement. Example:

你说中文说 得很好 。You speak Chinese well. (lit. You speak Chinese speak it well.)

Method #2: Move the object in front of the verb. Example:

你中文说 得很好 。You speak Chinese well. (lit. You Chinese speak well.)

Just to be completely clear, the following sentences are both incorrect:

你说中文 很好 。
你说中文 得很好 。

Now let's revisit some of those sentences from above and throw in some objects (and possibly an extra verb here or there) to make things interesting:

他说话说 得很快 。He speaks words quickly.
她日文说 得非常好 。She speaks Japanese very well.
他问题解释 得很清楚 。He understands the problem clearly.
这个人跳舞跳 得特别烂 。This person dances especially badly.
你怎么想事情想 得这么复杂 ？How do you think so complexly about these things?
还好你走路走 得慢 。You walk around slowly.
她做菜做 得好不好 ？Does she make food well?
我的朋友喝酒喝 得很厉害 ！My friend drinks a frightening amount of beer.

Note that for all the cases above, the verb is followed by a 得.

Also, one complicating factor for knowing when you're dealing with a verb plus an object is recognizing the object. This may sound obvious, but when dealing with separable verbs (like 说话), this may not be obvious at all.

Degree Complements Following Adjectives

The expression of "degree" following a verb is quite broad. A vast array of adjectives can appear in the degree complement following verbs, indicating degree and quality. When it comes to adjectives, however, expression of degree is often much more limited. The following are some of the more common degree complements which follow adjectives.

这个人聪明 得很 。This person is very intelligent.
他固执 得不得了 。He is extremely stubborn.
那个人坏 得要命 。That person is incredibly bad.
痛 得不行 ！It hurts so badly!
你怎么想事情想 得这么复杂 ？How do you think about things that complexly?
还好你走路走 得慢 。You walk around slowly.
她做菜做 得好不好 ？Does she make food well?

Note that for all the cases above, the adjective is followed by a 得.

Degree Complements Following Adjectives (without a 得)

There are two especially common degree complements which can follow adjectives immediately and are not preceded by a 得:

极了 usually comes after adjectives with positive connotations (like 好), indicating an extremely high degree.
死了 usually comes after adjectives with negative connotations In recent years, however, 死了 very frequently comes after adjectives with positive connotations as well, commonly producing phrases like 可爱死了, 开心死了, 漂亮死了, etc., also indicating a high degree.</ref> (like 坏, 忙, 累, 臭, 难看), and are commonly used to exaggerate the degree of how bad something is.

这个人聪明极了。This person is very intelligent.
菜味道好极了。This foods flavor is extremely good.
她漂亮极了。She is very beautiful.
你的成绩棒极了！Your grades are really good!
最近你的发型难看死了！Your new hairstyle is terribly ugly!
他的袜子臭死了。His socks are so smelly.
每年春节的时候，我们都忙死了。Every year for the Spring Festival, we are extremely busy.
她的宝宝可爱死了。Her baby is so cute!

Please note that 死 can also act as a result complement. In the examples above, however, it merely indicates an extreme degree (no actual deaths involved!). In the last example, you might be wondering why "死了" is used with "可爱". After all, cute is a good thing! Recently, "死了" has been used with positive adjectives as well, resulting in phrases like "可爱死了","漂亮死了", and "容易死了".

References

↑ Example taken from Sinosplice.com: Syntactic Anguish of the Verb-Object-Modifier Variety

Sources and further reading

Books

A Practical Chinese Grammar For Foreigners (外国人实用汉语语法) (pp. 284-292) →buy
Chinese: An Essential Grammar, Second Edition (pp. 105-6) →buy
Integrated Chinese: Level 1, Part 2 (3rd ed) (p. 139) →buy

Websites

Oxford University website: Complement of degree 得
Yale University website: The Complement Of Degree

[1] Example taken from Sinosplice.com: Syntactic Anguish of the Verb-Object-Modifier Variety

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