COMPREHENDING LOGOGRAPHIC AND PHONETIC SYMBOLS IN JAPANESE AND ENGLISH-SPEAKING INDIVIDUALS
Abstract (summary)
This thesis reviews the role of orthography in reading, and describes three experiments that demonstrate a difference in the way individuals comprehend logographs and phonetic symbols. Logographs, such as Chinese characters, represent whole words, whereas phonetic symbols, such as those used in the English alphabetic system, represent units of speech sounds. A differential access hypothesis is proposed which posits that phonetic symbols have faster access to verbal codes, whereas logographic symbols have faster access to meaning. In Experiment 1, Japanese individuals were found to produce faster naming latencies for Kana (phonetic symbols) than for Kanji (logographs). Interference in a color naming task (the Stroop task), however, was greater in the presence of incompatible words written in Kanji. In Experiment 2, the differential access hypothesis was supported for English-speaking individuals when words and arrows were compared in a spatial selection task. Incompatible arrow stimuli produced a greater interference than words in a task that requires the subject to judge the spatial location of the stimulus. In Experiment 3, a Japanese version of the spatial selection task, Kana, Kanji, and arrow stimuli were all used to test the role of orthography in reading. In this task, Kanji characters were found to produce the greatest overall compatibility effect. The Kana, however, produced as much interference when a voice response was required, but not with a keypress response. Arrows produced as much interference as the Kanji using keypress responses, but not using voice responses. The findings imply that Kanji symbols are faster than Kana when meaning is accessed, and that Kanji is faster than arrows when verbal names are accessed.
Thus, Kanji facilitates both "logographic" and "verbal" processes. The Kana, however, facilitates mainly verbal processes, and the arrows mainly logographic processes. These findings support a dissociation between phonological recoding and semantic access in word recognition. This distinction was found for both English and Japanese readers.
Indexing (details)
Experiments;
Experimental psychology
0621: Psychology