To date, no studies have investigated how German intensifiers are distributed within a multi-dimensional system, and no studies have empirically investigated whether their use is sensitive to social factors such as sex and age. Using a large corpus of present-day spoken German (Forschungs- und Lehrkorpus Gesprochenes Deutsch ‘Research and Teaching Corpus of Spoken German’) the present study addresses two empirical questions. Firstly, how does the system of German adjective intensifiers currently look in terms of frequency and function? This question involves investigating the most frequently used German intensifiers, and examining whether specific types of intensifiers (i.e., Verstärker ‘amplifiers’) are more frequent than others (i.e., Begriffsminderung ‘downtoners’)? Secondly, is the use of German intensifiers sensitive to the social factors sex and age?
