I sent the following sentences to some Japanese friends of mine and all of
them seem to agree that the second one is more natural here. This left me
wondering why 代わりに does not work in this situation if it is supposed to mean
"instead of, in place off, substitute"

> 1.) 今日僕は中国の店で突然日本人の母子供に出会って、会話をするときに、発音を間違えたからその子に「かわいい」じゃなくて「こわい」と言ってしまった

> 2.) 今日僕は中国の店で突然日本人の母子供に出会って、会話をするときに、発音を間違えたから、その子に「かわいい」代わりに「こわい」と言ってしまった

Does this expression have some kind of restriction?
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2022-01-19T09:55:30.360
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2022-01-21T02:50:45.697
2022-01-19T17:08:36.477
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question
grammar meaning word-choice nuances
A question regarding the usage of 代わりに？
From a grammatical aspect, you need の before 代わりに. When you use 代わりに at the
beginning of a sentence, の is not needed.

However `「かわいい」の代わりに「こわい」と言ってしまった` is still a bit strange as 代わりに implies
intentional meaning. じゃなくて (or ではなくて) can be used for both intentional and
unintentional cases so this time じゃなくて sounds natural.
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answer