"Needs cleaned" or "needs to be cleaned"

I'm from Western Pennsylvania. Until I moved away, I never realized that when I omitted the to be from phrases like needs to be cleaned, my usage was different than what most English speakers are accustomed to. Is it wrong?

Solution 1:

I have never been introduced to the behavior in this question Central Pennsylvanian English speakers: what are the limitations on the "needs washed" construction? so I'm surprised ... Also duly informed. ;)

For the "rest of us" it's my experience that it's almost always appropriate to include the "to be" in a phrase.

I'm trying to track down a way to know that it should be done, but generally I've found that if you say "needs" or "wants" you either say to be _________ed or _________ing depending on the case of the verb that you want to use.

Some cases:

My dog needs to be walked.
My dog needed bathing.

A similar use case:

We need to do laundry.
The laundry needs to be done.

Using want:

I wanted to go to the park.
I wanted to take a shower.
I wanted to bathe my dog.

I'm just not sure what the original context would've been to offer corrections. Maybe with some more concrete examples from the region?

Solution 2:

I spent four undergrad years in Pittsburgh. This was the only place where I had heard the construction such as

The car needs washed.

An interesting article by the Grammar Girl gives the name of the phenomenon (infinitival copula deletion), the name of an academic researcher (Barbara Johnstone), and whether it passes the cover letter test.

Grammar Girl's measured response: OK for North Midland, but "wrong everywhere else."

There's also a Google Map of where the Grammar Girl's Facebook and Google+ friends had heard the construction. This may not be scientifically rigorous, but it's interesting.

https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid=217481423436362434756.0004ac5e261a86dafdd6f&msa=0&ll=6.547069,-112.807617&spn=176.634502,105.46875&dg=feature