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Table of Contents
The Royal Order of Adjectives
The Royal Order of Adjectives is used to refer an unconscious rule that native English speakers instinctively apply when using multiple adjectives (before a noun).
Consider the following phrase:
“A green velvet Turkish fitted elegant large smoking jacket.”
It doesn’t sound quite right does it? Now consider:
“An elegant large old fitted green velvet Turkish smoking jacket.”
Here's the magic formula, whenever you are using more than one adjective they fall into the order:
Opinion → Size → Age → Shape → Color → Origin → Material → Purpose
So you'd naturally say "a beautiful small old round blue Chinese silk evening dress," not "a silk blue old Chinese beautiful small round evening dress." The first sounds perfectly normal; the second makes you want to correct it, even though you probably can't explain why.
If you deviate from this order it will trigger at least some degree of cognitive dissonance in your subject. Think of it like this: Your brain is a bouncer at an exclusive club, and adjectives have to line up in the right order to get past the velvet rope. Break the order, and your linguistic bouncer immediately knows something's off, even if your conscious mind doesn't know quite what it is.
This seemingly trivial grammar quirk has become a surprisingly powerful tool for intelligence professionals and others who study human behavior.
How is this Useful for HUMINT Collection & Behaviour Modification?
Cognitive Load Detection
Native speakers follow the order unconsciously, so deviations often indicate:
Stress or fatigue - People revert to non-native patterns when cognitively overloaded and/or
Deception - Lying increases mental burden, causing grammatical slips and/or
Non-native speakers - Useful for detecting deep cover spies and those who are trying to belong
Field Application: Listen for "the wooden old table" instead of "the old wooden table". Note when someone makes these deviations, is it while responding to questions about a specific topic (they may be hesitant or concealing something) or does it seem to be more a sign of fatigue?
It can also be used as a rather strong indicator of early social class and education. Note there are some regional variants so as with many things, use this within appropriate contexts.
Ask subjects to describe a complex scene quickly. Native speakers maintain adjective order even when rushed, while those operating in a second language or under extreme stress will break the pattern.
Memory Reconstruction / Truth Detection
When someone recalls events, natural adjective ordering suggests genuine memory, while rehearsed stories, ironically, often contain unnatural constructions. For example:
Genuine memory: "He had this beat-up old red pickup truck"
Rehearsed story: "He drove a red old beat-up truck" (sounds memorized, not naturally recalled)
Rapport Building
It has been suggested that matching the target's adjective complexity and ordering patterns may encourage rapport at an unconscious level creating greater psychological comfort and trust. For example,
If the subject says "nice little place," mirror with "cozy small restaurant" (not "small cozy restaurant").
NOTE: THIS IS PURELY THEORETICAL AND I HAVE SEEN NO RESEARCH TO SUPPORT THIS ASSERTION.
The Bottom Line
The Royal Order of Adjectives is a sorting operation that operates below conscious awareness, making it a reliable indicator of authentic cognitive state and linguistic background. As with almost all cognitive state indicators IT IS ONLY USEFUL if you can determine a baseline state for the subject (outside of using it to detect if English isn’t a primary language).
For HUMINT professionals, this grammatical quirk becomes a strong data point in person's mental state, educational background, and truthfulness.