how/ what was your first impression of me?

English as a Second Language English Vocabulary, Grammar and Idioms
1

Hi,

I have a question on whether I use how or what in the sentence below:

_______ was your first impression of me?

The answer is “what”, but how about “how”? In Korean which is my mother tongue, “how” is more reasonable. But what about English? Please let me know!

Thanks in advance,
sweetpumpkin

2

For my part, only “what” is acceptable and the most common.

3

Thanks! but… I wanted to know why ‘how’ cannot take the blank.

4

‘How’ means in what way or manner, so doesn’t work with that question.
You are not asking ‘in what way was your impression of me?’
You are asking for particular information about their impression of you, and for that we use ‘what’
What was your impression of me? = Tell me about your impression of me?

To use ‘how’ you would need a different focus.
You could say ‘How was your first impression of me incorrect?’ (‘In what way was your first impression of me wrong?’).

It’s not usually a good idea to compare the usage of a translated word in two languages.