Is there a name for the practice of directly reflecting back a questioner's words, and is it really that important in Japanese?


I don't really think this is 相槌; I tried searching here for "reflection" or
"mirroring" as well but didn't find anything.

Let's take this example conversation:

> A: ゴールデンウイークにどこかへ行きますか。
>
> B: 観光地はその期間はいつも混んでいるんだから、東京で過ごそうと思っています。

A teacher suggested that by, adding the following, it becomes easier to
understand (分かりやすくなる) but is not strictly necessary:

> A: ゴールデンウイークにどこかへ行きますか。
>
> B: 観光地はその期間はいつも混んでいるんだから、 **どこも行きませんよ** 。
>
> 東京で過ごそうと思っています。

To me, this doesn't add any extra information and just duplicates the meaning
of what was already there -- in fact, it's inappropriate in many situations,
such as if B actually lives in Kyoto, and is planning on spending Golden Week
in Tokyo in order to avoid crowds in Kyoto.

Does this phenomenon of reflecting back _exactly the same phrasing that the
questioner used_ have a name? And is it more important than in English? It
just seems unnatural to me.

To put it another way, I'm having difficulty understanding why the teacher
felt it was necessary to add this phrase to the conversation. All of the other
edits on this assignment (which is about practicing the 〜んだから expression) are
just corrections of simple grammatical errors, which makes this one stand out
as I'm sure there's lots of ways my conversations could be rewritten that are
left unstated when my work is corrected.




> Does this phenomenon of reflecting back _exactly the same phrasing_ that the
> questioner used have a name?

There is a phrase
[オウム返し](https://jisho.org/word/%E9%B8%9A%E9%B5%A1%E8%BF%94%E3%81%97), which
refers to something like saying "Spent 125 million yen!?" right after someone
says "I spent 125 million yen". But 行きますか and 行きません are not "exactly the
same", so you cannot use this phrase in your situation.

> I'm having difficulty understanding why the teacher felt it was necessary to
> add this phrase to the conversation.

Your way of answering is not wrong at all, but I understand why your teacher
felt it could be improved.

In general, when you are asked a question, it is preferable to give the most
direct answer. For example, if someone asks you, "What time is tomorrow's
flight?", it might not be wrong in reality to answer indirectly with something
like "If we leave here at 8, we'll make it in time" or "I'll wake you up when
it's time". But it wouldn't be surprising if someone pointed out that such an
approach is not ideal, at least for writing practice. You should say "9:30"
first, and then add whatever you want to. This kind of thing is a basic tip
for writing clear and easy-to-understand sentences, regardless of whether
you're writing in English or in Japanese.

In your case, the question is basically a yes/no question, so you could have
started your response with either はい/Yes or いいえ/No, and that would be the most
effective way of making your answer sound clear. Technically, starting your
response with 'No' may be "redundant", but you wouldn't say that's a bad
habit, would you? Likewise, saying どこにも行きません is another good option here; it
answers the question directly, and it's not long enough to be called a
"mirroring" at all.

