JPR_035.fm Page 69 Monday, February 17, 2003 4:22 PM

Japanese Psychological Research
2003, Volume 45, No. 2, 69–79

The cognitive processing of Japanese loanwords
in katakana

ORIGINAL ARTICLE
Munksgaard

KATSUO TAMAOKA1
International Student Center, Hiroshima University, Hiroshima, JapanYAYOI MIYAOKA
Hiroshima University of Economics, Hiroshima, Japan

Abstract: The present study examined two questions concerning the cognitive processingof Japanese loanwords borrowed from English and written in katakana. The first question
was whether “interlexical activation” occurs between Japanese and English. Results froma lexical decision task showed that loanwords phonetically similar to the original English
words were judged with the same speed and accuracy as those being phonetically dissimilar
to their original English words. The study further examined the cognitive processing of
unadopted loanwords (i.e., words unlisted in a Japanese loanword dictionary). Reaction
times displayed the shortest mean for non-words, followed by pseudo-loanwords, andfinally unadopted loanwords. Thus, the only time the lexical representation of an original English
word was possibly activated was when native Japanese speakers had seldom seen theword in katakana. The second question was what creates the “lexical mental boundary”
between adopted and unadopted loanwords. A questionnaire showed that native Japanese
speakers are likely to use decision-making strategies for determining lexicality of loanwords
in Japanese based on their daily experience of exposure to katakana words in print.
Key words: Japanese loanwords, interlexical activation, lexical mental boundary, phonetic
similarity and dissimilarity, katakana.

Throughout the last three decades, Japanese,
which has a long history of borrowing linguistic
elements from other languages, has adopted
many alphabetic loanwords from English. In
fact, this trend has steadily accelerated over
the years, particularly in the areas of popular
culture and scientific study. Loanwords (called
gairaigo in Japanese) are printed in the script
called katakana, which consists of Japanesephonetic symbols used specifically for thephonetic transcription of foreign words. Dueto the relative ease with which katakana canphonetically transcribe loanwords, more andmore are seen making their way into Japanese,

especially from English. This being the case,the question arises as to how Japanese native
speakers determine the meaning of a loanword
when they see it for the first time. Since Japanesepeople, especially the younger generation,
usually study English for at least six years from
Grades 7–12, it could be the case that they
use their knowledge of English to understandnewly created Japanese loanwords.
Numerous loanwords are found in Japanesefashion magazines, which target younger
women. Because of the popularity of American and European fashions in Japan, themarket is saturated with magazines such as

1
Correspondence concerning this article should be sent to: Katsuo Tamaoka, International Student Center, Hiroshima
University, 1-1, I-chome, Kagamiyama, Higashi-Hiroshima 739-8524, Japan (Email: ktamaoka@hiroshima-u.ac.jp).

© 2003 Japanese Psychological Association. Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

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K. Tamaoka and Y. Miyaoka

AnAn, Cosmopolitan, Elle, More, Non-Non
and Voce . Loanwords are very often a
combination of multiple words such as(domestic movement) and(simple life). Someloanwords found in such types of Japanesemagazines do not even exist in English. Instead,Japanese speakers have coined them as a way
to provide a cachet of authentic English words.
As such, loanwords in Japanese fashion magazines seem impossible to understand without
reasonable English knowledge.
In order to investigate the cognitive processing of Japanese loanwords, the present study
classified these words into three types. The first
type was those loanwords listed in the Japanesedictionary, which could be considered as standard Japanese words. These loanwords are
frequently used in various texts, so native
Japanese speakers are likely to see them very
often (i.e., high frequency loanwords). The
second type of loanwords consisted of those
not appearing in the Japanese dictionary, but
included in specialized Japanese loanword
dictionaries. These loanwords are occasionallyseen in magazines devoted to fashion, cooking,sports, computers, and academic studies. Thus,
these words could be considered as newly
adopted loanwords, which may not be seen so
often (i.e., low frequency loanwords). The third
type of loanwords was comprised of those having appeared in some publications, but whichhave not yet achieved the status of inclusion ineither a general use or a specialized loanword
dictionary. This type of loanword was thus called
an “unadopted” loanword.
With regards to these three types of loanwords,
the first question posed was whether native
Japanese speakers make use of their English
knowledge when they come across loanwords
originating from English words (i.e., “interlexical
activation”). Using the assumptions of cognitive
processing, this question is rephrased as “Donative Japanese speakers activate lexical representations of English words while processing
Japanese loanwords?” If Japanese loanwords
automatically cause such activation, representations for original English words having
much the same pronunciation as their loanword© Japanese Psychological Association 2003.

counterpart should be more easily activated.
Therefore, using the lexical decision task, thepresent study compared the speed and accuracyof phonetically similar and dissimilar loanwords,
forming two stimulus groups. In addition, as highfrequency loanwords are assumed to have a lower
threshold in reaching lexical activation, thepresent study selected loanwords with phonetic
similarity/dissimilarity using a cross-section ofboth high and low frequency words.
The second question put forward in thepresent study was if and why a “lexical mental
boundary” exists between newly adopted andunadopted loanwords. Is it possible that native
Japanese speakers make judgments as to whether
or not they have previously seen the sameloanword in katakana? If this is so and they
have not seen the word before, it may be thatthey check to see if they know it in English.
However, some native Japanese speakers
may have seen these “unadopted loanwords” intrendy magazines. Thus, the present study examined whether native Japanese speakers could
reject unadopted loanwords (“No” responses
for lexical decision) more easily than nonsense
non-words and even pseudo-loanwords (createdby changing a single mora from real loanwords).
Results were further examined with a shortquestionnaire whereby native Japanese speakers
were asked if they had seen the unadopted
loanwords in question, written in katakana. If
the correlation between the data (i.e., error rates
and reaction times) from the lexical decisiontask and that from the questionnaire on seeing
unadopted loanwords in katakana is high, thiswould show that the lexical mental boundaryis established by previous exposure to loanwords
in katakana.
The correlation result will provide someindication as to the first question as well. If ahigh correlation found between the frequencyof seeing unadopted loanwords in katakana
and the data of the lexical decision task ishigh, subjects may be able to respond “No” forunadopted loanwords by simply asking themselves whether they have seen these stimuli inkatakana before. In this way, all three types ofloanwords aforementioned would then need
to be examined according to the cognitive model

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Processing of Japanese loanwords––
soil, salute, abroad
48
24
24
Nonwords
Pseudo-loanwords
Unadopted loanwords

Numberof items
Correct “No” responses

High frequency: Similar to English sounds
Dissimilar to English sounds
Low frequency: Similar to English sounds
Dissimilar to English sounds

24
24
24
24

Stimuli in katakana

Phonetic transcription“remoN”, “oranpu”, “purezento”“rajio”, “toNneru”, “vresutoraN”“gifuto”, “pisutoru”, “anaunsu”“suriru”, “omuretu”, “bakuteria”

Phonetic transcription
Loanwords in katakana
Numberof items
Type of response
Correct “Yes” responses

Stimulus items
An equal number of 96 stimulus items eachfrom the “Yes” and “No” responses were selected
for the experiment (a total of 192 items). As
shown in Table 1, Japanese loanwords withhigh and low word frequencies of occurrencein printed texts were selected for the correct“Yes” responses. Each loanword frequency was
taken from the index established by the National
Institute for Japanese Language (1973). This
word frequency index was calculated from thewords printed in the three major Asahi, Yomiuri,
and Mainichi newspapers during 1966. Fortyeight high frequency loanwords and 48 low
frequency loanwords were selected on thebasis of this index. Loanwords were also divided
up according to whether or not their pronunciations were similar to or dissimilar to theoriginal English words. For example, the loanword “”, meaning “lemon” in English, ispronounced in Japanese as “remoN” (N refers
to nasal). This sound is relatively similar to
the English sound for “lemon,” except that the
English consonant of “l” is replaced by “r.” Thesecond condition was loanwords which were

ExamplesSubjects
Twenty-four undergraduate and graduate
students, all native Japanese speakers, participated in the study. The subjects consisted of
20 females and 4 males. The overall average ageof the 24 subjects was 23 years and 10 months(SD = 23 months). Because all the subjects inthe present study were enrolled in a prestigious
Japanese university requiring a high level ofEnglish ability, they were assumed to have agood knowledge of English.

Table 1.

MethodJapanese loanwords used as stimulus items for the lexical decision task

Experiment: The Lexical
Decision Task

“kunesa”, “nohureti”, “mekuhonaso”“garuho”, “setareo”, “purogaramu”“soiru”, “saruRto”, “aburoRdo”

Original English words

lemon, trump, present
radio, tunnel, restaurant
gift, pistol, announce
thrill, omelet, bacteria

Original English wordsof automatic “interlexical activation” between
Japanese and English.
Through the investigation of these two questions, the present study provides an explanationof the cognitive processing of Japanese loanwords in katakana.

71© Japanese Psychological Association 2003.

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K. Tamaoka and Y. Miyaoka

72

Table 2. Indexes of word frequency and phonemic similarity for Japanese
loanwords used as stimuli for the correct “Yes” responses
1966 freq.
index(times)2000 freq.
index(times)Textbook
freq. index(times)Number ofJapanesephonemes

Number ofdifferent
phonemes% ofphonemedifferenceHigh frequency:
Similar to English sounds
Dissimilar to English sounds

29.38
36.04

2353.633467.71

5.83
6.08

7.58
7.75

3.83
5.00

50.18%
65.86%

Low frequency:
Similar to English sounds
Dissimilar to English sounds

12.25
8.83

949.71
715.67

1.08
1.00

7.83
7.79

3.50
4.54

45.37%
59.17%

Type of loanword

pronounced differently from their English
counterparts. The English word “thrill,” which
is presented in Japanese as “”, is pronounced as “suriru” in Japanese. The phonemesof “” in Japanese differ from the English
phonemes for “thrill,” except for “r” and “i”. In
this manner, we chose 24 phonetically similar anddissimilar items for each condition of high and low
word frequency for the correct “Yes” responses.
The means of high/low word frequencies
and phonetic similarity / dissimilarity for theselected loanwords are reported in Table 2. Inorder to examine the two independent valuesof the stimulus items, a 2 (high and low word
frequency) × 2 (phonetically similar and dissimilar)
analysis of variance (ANOVA) was performedon the data from each index shown in Table 2.
The difference between the means of the highfrequency loanwords and the low frequency
loanwords was significant [F(1,93) = 7.08, p < 0.01].
As we expected, the mean difference between
the phonetically similar and dissimilar loanwords
was not significant.
The index of word frequency in three 1966
newspapers (National Institute for Japanese
Language, 1973) was established over 30 years
ago, so there was a concern that the frequencyof the loanwords from this index could havechanged over time. Amano and Kondo (2000),
having used 1985–98 editions of the Asahi
newspaper, produced a very large lexical corpusof 341,771 words (i.e., type frequency) having
a frequency of occurrence of 287,792,797 times(i.e., token frequency). Thus, this newly createdindex of word frequency was used to calculate© Japanese Psychological Association 2003.

the word frequency of chosen stimulus items.2
The means of word frequency are shown in
Table 2. A 2 (high and low word frequency) × 2(phonetically similar and dissimilar) ANOVA was
performed for word frequencies. The results
showed that there was a significant difference
between high and low frequency of loanwords[F(1,95) = 13.49, p < 0.001] while there was no
significant difference between loanwords having
phonetic similarity or dissimilarity. Interactionof these main effects was not significant. Consequently, loanwords chosen on the basis of word
frequency in 1966 were still reasonably viable
as stimulus items in light of the newest index ofword frequency by Amano and Kondo (2000).
The loanword frequency index provided by
Quackenbush, Fukada, and Kobayashi (1993),
which calculated frequency of occurrence forloanwords in Japanese language textbooks
for international students, was also used inthis study, with the result being the same as forthe word frequency index from the newspapers.
There was a significant difference in the frequency of word usage in textbooks between
the stimulus loanwords with high and low
frequencies [F(1,93) = 35.34, p < 0.0001], but nodifference between the phonetically similar
and dissimilar loanwords. Thus, the variable of2
When this experiment was conducted in the early partof 2000, the database of Amano and Kondo (2000) was
not yet available. Therefore, a newer index was used to
examine loanwords with high and low frequency
selected for stimuli in the lexical decision task after theexperiment was completed.

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Processing of Japanese loanwords

word frequency was not considered to have aneffect on the results of the experiment using
the phonetically similar and dissimilar loanwords
as stimulus items.
For the variable of phonetic similarity anddissimilarity, the number of phonemes used toconstruct the Japanese loanwords was counted.
The phonemes in each loanword were comparedto the phonemes of each English counterpart.
Based on the Japanese phonemes of eachloanword, the number of phonetic differences
was recorded and used as a basis for creating
the two stimulus groups of loanwords. Eachstimulus item selected for phonetic similarityand dissimilarity was constructed from thesame number of Japanese phonemes. The means
concerning the number of phonemes in theloanwords are shown in Table 2. The sametwo-way ANOVA was used for testing thesedifferences. Results showed no significant main
effects of either phonetic similarity/dissimilarity
or high / low word frequencies on the numberof phonemes. The index of phonemic differences was then tested using the same two-way
ANOVA. The results indicated a main effect ofphonetic similarity/dissimilarity [F(1,93) = 9.76,
p < 0.0001], but a main effect of high / low word
frequency was not significant. To confirm theviability of the grouping for phonetic similarityand dissimilarity, the percentage of phonetic
differences was calculated by taking the numberof different phonemes in each loanword ascompared to the original English word anddividing it by the total number of phonemes
constructing each loanword. The average
percentages of phonetic differences for the twovariables of high / low word frequencies andphonetic similarity/dissimilarity are reported
in Table 2. The same two-way ANOVA was
performed to examine its effect. As expected,
there was a significant main effect of phonetic
similarity and dissimilarity of phonetic differences[F(1,93) = 25.35, p < 0.0001], but no difference
between high and low word frequencies. Therefore, the effects of phonetic similarity anddissimilarity can be examined using these twogroups of stimulus items.
As shown in Table 1, there were threestimulus conditions for the correct “No”

73

responses for the lexical decision task. First, 24
real English words, which had not been adopted
as Japanese loanwords, were chosen. As mentioned in the earlier part of this paper, a typicalJapanese dictionary is rather conservative interms of the number of loanwords it lists, andbecause a loanword dictionary (e.g., Sanseido,
1991; Kaieda, 1996) contains a greater numberof loanwords, a loanword dictionary edited by
Kaieda (1996) was used for this study. Thisloanword dictionary collected 22,000 words
from a wide range of genres, and was therefore
considered to be an adequate indicator for
judging adopted or unadopted Japanese words.
The loanword dictionary of Kaieda (1996) wasused as the sole criterion for the unfamiliarityof a word in Japanese texts. For example, since
the English word “soil” is not listed in theloanword dictionary, it can be then regarded as
not being used in Japanese written texts. It
should, however, be noted that some native
Japanese speakers might have previously seen
this word somewhere presented in katakana.
This served as a basis for the need of performing additional research using a questionnaire.
In the second category, we created 24 pseudoloanwords by altering a few phonemes inexisting Japanese loanwords with a relatively
high word frequency. For example, from Table 1“” “setareo” was created from the existing Japanese loanword of “
” “sutereo”(“stereo” in English), by changing the firstvowels of “u” to “e”, and “e” to “a”. For the third
category, 48 non-words, which did not soundlike any loanword, were created as a control
stimulus group for the unadopted loanwords
and pseudo-loanwords. The average numberof morae in the three stimulus categories was
the same. Since the only possible variable tocontrol for the three categories was thisphonetic factor, we did not conduct any analysis for the stimulus items of the correct “No”
responses.

Instruments and procedure
Existing words as well as non-words wererandomly presented to subjects in the center of
a computer screen (Toshiba, J-3100 Plasma
display, Tokyo, Japan) 600 milliseconds after© Japanese Psychological Association 2003.

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K. Tamaoka and Y. Miyaoka

74

the appearance of an eye fixation point marked
by an asterisk “*” The subjects were instructed
to respond as quickly, but as accurately, as possible
in deciding whether the item was a Japanese
loanword or not. Responses were registered bypressing a “Yes” or “No” button. Twenty-four
practice trials were given to the subjects prior
to commencement of actual testing.

Results
Only correct responses were used for the
calculation of mean reaction times. Responses
with reaction times slower than 2000 ms or
faster than 200 ms were recorded as incorrect.
Only 13 responses fell into this category. Before
performing the analysis, reaction times outsideof 2.5 standard deviations in both the high andlow range were replaced by the boundaries
indicated by 2.5 standard deviations from theindividual means of subjects. The mean reaction
times and error rates for the lexical decisiontask are presented in Table 3. The statistical tests
which follow analyze both subject (F1) anditem (F2) variability.

Analysis of reaction times for the correct“Yes” responses
According to the data of the “Yes” responses,
native Japanese speakers made lexical decisions
for loanwords with high word frequency fasterthan for loanwords with low word frequency. A
2 (high and low word frequency) × 2 (phoneticallysimilar and dissimilar) ANOVA for repeatedmeasures showed a significant difference forreaction times in subject means [F1(1,23) = 42.76,
p < 0.0001] and item means [F2(1,93) = 7.59,
p < 0.001]. This finding of a word frequency
effect on lexical decision was predicted inprevious studies (e.g., Balota & Chumbley, 1984;
Forster, 1976; Whaley, 1978; Taft, 1979, 1991;
Grainger, 1990). These studies suggested thatthe latency of lexical decision and naming of aword with high frequency of usage was shorter
than that of a word with low frequency. Anothervariable intended for investigation was thephonetic similarity of loanwords. The difference
in reaction times was significant in subject
means [F1(1,23) = 4.33, p < 0.05], but not significant
in item means [F2(1,93) = 0.66, p = 0.42]. In thatthe item analysis did not show a significant
main effect on reaction time, some specificloanwords may have influenced the significant
result of subject analysis concerning the variableof phonetic similarity and dissimilarity.

Analysis of error rates for the correct“Yes” responses
The same two-way ANOVA showed that thedifference between low and high frequency
loanwords was significant in both subject means[F1(1,23) = 54.31, p < 0.0001] and item means[F2(1,93) = 8.45, p < 0.005]. A word frequency
effect was apparent in the lexical decision task
for loanwords. The difference in error rates
regarding loanwords phonetically similar andTable 3. Reaction times and error rates of lexical decisions for Japanese loanwords
Type of response

Reaction times (ms)Error rates (%)

Correct “Yes” responses
High frequency: Similar to English sounds
Dissimilar to English sounds
Low frequency: Similar to English sounds
Dissimilar to English sounds

575 (62)577 (65)603 (63)621 (68)

1.91 (3.68)
2.43 (3.87)
8.68 (6.26)
11.81 (6.34)

Correct “No” responses
Nonwords
Pseudo-loanwords
Unadopted loanwords

603 (91)679 (101)
757 (172)0.69 (1.18)
3.99 (5.56)
27.95 (16.60)

Figures in parentheses indicate standard deviations.
© Japanese Psychological Association 2003.

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Processing of Japanese loanwords

dissimilar to their original English words
was significant in subject means [F1(1,23) = 4.29,
p < 0.05], but not significant in item means[F2(1,93) = 0.43, p = 0.51]. As observed in theanalysis of reaction times, the stimulus itemsof loanwords affected the significant result of
the subject analysis. Consequently, it was concluded that phonetic similarity of loanwords totheir English originals had no effect on lexicaldecisions for the correct “Yes” responses asmeasured by reaction times and error rates.

Analysis of reaction times for the correct“No” responses
As shown in Table 3, the mean reaction times
for the correct “No” responses displayed aclear trend of non-words having the shortest
mean, followed by pseudo-loanwords andthe unadopted loanwords. A one-way ANOVA
for repeated measures on reaction times of
the correct “No” responses showed a significant
main effect on processing the three types ofstimuli in both subject analysis [F1(2,46) = 43.28,
p < 0.0001] and item analysis [F2(2,93) = 62.76,
p < 0.0001]. Further analysis with an orthogonal
polynomial comparison was carried out to isolate the main effect on the stimulus conditions.
The mean reaction time in lexical decisions
for the unadopted loanwords was slower thanfor the pseudo-loanwords. This difference wassignificant [F1(1,23) = 16.71, p < 0.001]. The mean
reaction time for pseudo-loanwords was slower
than for the nonwords. This difference was alsosignificant [F1(1,23) = 119.72, p < 0.0001]. The largest
difference in reaction times between unadopted
loanwords and non-words was also significant[F1(1,23) = 58.41, p < 0.0001]. These differencesamong the three stimulus conditions for thecorrect “No” responses were also confirmed byusing the analysis of Duncan’s multiple range
comparison test applied on item means.
For the correct “No” responses, pseudoloanwords were created by slightly altering
original loanwords. For example, as shown in
Table 1,, pronounced as “purogaramu” in Japanese, was produced by changing
a single vowel from the original Japanese
loanword of“puroguramu” (meaning “program” in English). A previous study

75

by Tamaoka and Taft (1994) found that such
pseudo-loanwords (e.g.,“komera” from“kamera” meaning “camera” in English)
took longer to correctly reject in a lexical decision task than loanwords which had two morae
altered from the original loanwords (e.g.,“rimaru” from“hoteru” meaning “hotel”
in English). Once the two morae of the original
loanwords were changed, the loanwords losttheir “word-likeliness.” These altered stringsof morae can hardly be termed loanwords, butrather as non-words which do not activate
any other entries within the Japanese lexicon.
Tamaoka and Taft proposed that Japanesepseudo-loanwords activated their original counterpart loanwords because they still kept the “wordlikeliness” of the original counterparts. Theseauthors showed that pseudo-loanwords were
rejected more slowly in the lexical decision task
than non-words. The present study also obtained
the same results that Tamaoka and Taft foundin their study. In addition to this, results fromthe experiment found that unadopted loanwords
required even longer latencies for lexical decision
than pseudo-loanwords. This result implies
that the processing of unadopted loanwords
may be subject to more than just the effects ofloanword-likeliness in katakana found in theprocessing of pseudo-loanwords.

Analysis of error rates for the correct “No”
responses
As observed from the analysis performed on
the mean reaction times, mean error rates forcorrect “No” responses shown in Table 3 also
exhibited the same results as reaction times.
The one-way ANOVA for repeated measuresrevealed a significant main effect of the threestimulus conditions in both subject means[F1(2,46) = 55.89, p < 0.0001] and item means[F2(2,93) = 77.13, p < 0.0001]. Furthermore, anorthogonal polynomial comparison was carriedout to isolate the main effect on the stimulus
conditions. The unadopted loanwords were
rejected as existing Japanese loanwords lessaccurately than were the pseudo-loanwords[F1(1,23) = 53.29, p < 0.0001]. Needless to say, theunadopted loanwords were also rejected lessaccurately than non-words [F1(1,23) = 63.5,© Japanese Psychological Association 2003.

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K. Tamaoka and Y. Miyaoka

76

p < 0.0001]. Furthermore, the pseudo-loanwords
were significantly less accurately rejected than
the non-words [F1(1,23) = 8.77, p < 0.01]. These
differences among the three stimulus conditions
for correct “No” responses were confirmed by
the analysis of Duncan’s multiple range comparison tested on item means of error rates.

Discussion
The present experiment has attempted to answer
the two questions posed in the introductionof this study. Subjects showed no differencein speed and accuracy when making “Yes”
responses in the lexical decision of phoneticallysimilar and dissimilar loanwords with both highand low frequency, although loanwords withhigh frequency were processed faster and moreaccurately than loanwords with low frequency.
Thus, “interlexical activation” between thelexicons of Japanese loanwords and English words
does not happen during the processing of loanwords with both high and low frequency.
An interesting finding concerned the resultsof the “No” responses. The unadopted loanwords
such as(“soil”),(“salute”), and(“abroad”) were commonly seen
in English texts. As calculated from the meansof reaction times in Table 3, the difference of
154 ms as rejection time for lexical decisions
between non-words and unadopted loanwords
implied that native Japanese speakers viewed
unadopted loanwords as something more thanjust a nonsense string of morae in katakana.
Furthermore, the difference of 76 ms between
pseudo-loanwords and unadopted loanwords
implied that some extra processing activity was
involved in correctly rejecting the unadopted
loanwords. Because the present study used
university students as subjects, it was assumed
that they had gained sufficient English knowledge during their high school years to guessthe meanings of these unadopted loanwords.
Therefore, this result suggests the possibility
that “interlexical activation” between Japaneseand English is involved in arriving at a correct
lexical decision for unadopted loanwords.
However, a possible alternative explanation
for the long reaction times for “No” responses© Japanese Psychological Association 2003.

to unadopted loanwords is related to thesecond question of “lexical mental boundary.”
Subjects may have made a decision based upon
their exposure to unadopted loanwords printed
in katakana. For example, the unadopted
loanword“soil” may have been seen in
katakana among some subjects who are interested in ecology. Likewise,“abroad”
is frequently printed in katakana in journals
related to study abroad, although this word is
not listed in the katakana loanword dictionaryof Kaieda (1996). Naturally, native Japanese
speakers who have seen these unadopted loanwords in katakana will judge them as existing
Japanese loanwords. In this sense, subjects
utilized their daily experience to katakana exposure without using their knowledge of English.
Therefore, the additional questionnaire study
which asked native Japanese speakers whether
they had ever seen the unadopted loanwords
before was necessary in order to investigate
relations between previous exposure to unadopted loanwords in katakana and the data(error rates and reaction times) from the lexicaldecision experiment.

Additional Research: The Study
Done by Questionnaire
MethodSubjects
Twenty undergraduate and graduate students,
all native Japanese speakers, participated in thisstudy. Subjects consisted of 8 females and 12
males. The overall average age of the 20 subjects
was 29 years and 1 month (SD = 8 years, 3 months).
Stimulus items
The 24 unadopted loanwords used in thelexical decision task were used to create aquestionnaire. As mentioned in the previous
experiment, the chosen unadopted loanwords
existed in English but were unlisted in a Japanese
loanword dictionary (Kaieda, 1996).
Questionnaire and calculation
In the questionnaire, subjects were asked ifthey had previously seen the 24 unadopted

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Processing of Japanese loanwords

Table 4. Correlations among previous
exposure to unadopted loanwords,
error rates and reaction times

1 Reaction times
2 Error rates (%)
3 Previous exposure (%)

1

2

3

–
0.662*
0.149–
0.649*–*p < 0.01.

loanwords in katakana. Previous exposure toeach unadopted loanword was calculated by
the number of “Yes” answers divided by the
total of the 20 subjects.

Results
The overall mean of “Yes” answers regarding
previous exposure to the 24 unadopted loanwords was 28.54% with a standard deviationof 17.27%. Pearson’s correlation coefficientswere reported in Table 4. Results from theanalysis of these correlations showed a significance between error rates and reaction times
in the lexical decision task (r = 0.662, p < 0.01).
The lower the error rates, the faster the reaction
times. There was also a high correlation between
previous exposure to the unadopted loanwords
and error rates in the lexical decision task showedsignificantly high correlation (r = 0.649, p < 0.01).
From among the 24 unadopted loanwords usedas stimulus items, those that had previously
been seen in katakana were likely to be givena correct “Yes” response as existing Japanese
loanwords. There was, however, no significantly
high correlation found between reaction times
and previous exposure (r = 0.149, ns). Speedof lexical decision had no relation to one’s
exposure to unadopted loanwords.

Discussion
In addition to the lexical decision task, thepresent study conducted additional research
providing the 20 native Japanese speakers witha questionnaire to fill out. Previous exposure
to the 24 unadopted loanwords in katakana listed77

in the questionnaire was highly correlated witherror rates from the lexical decision task. Thishigh correlation indicates that unadopted
loanwords, which have been previously seen in
katakana, are likely to be perceived as existing
Japanese loanwords. Consequently, this suggeststhat subjects made a “Yes” or “No” final decisionin the lexical decision task not based upon
“interlexical activation” but upon their previous
exposure to the provided stimuli in katakana.
This formed the basis for arriving at the second
question regarding a “lexical mental boundary.”
The correlation between previous exposure
to the 24 unadopted loanwords in katakana
and reaction times for lexical decision of theseloanwords was not significantly high. Thus,
speed of lexical decision was not related toprevious exposure. On the other hand, reaction
times for lexical decision of these loanwords
showed much longer latencies than those ofboth non-words and pseudo-loanwords. This
result suggests that lexical decision of unadopted
loanwords is not only a more complex cognitive process than the one required for simple
rejection of non-words, but it is also affectedby more than just orthography, which is seen asa hindrance in the process required for lexicaldecision using pseudo-loanwords. Althoughprevious exposure to unadopted loanwords inkatakana was related to error rates, it is quitepossible that subjects in this study may haveactivated lexical representations of original
English words in the process of lexical decision.

General Discussion
Japanese loanwords are created by simply
transforming the original sounds of alphabetic
foreign words into those of the Japanesephonetic system. In the process of this phonetic transformation, some loanwords arepronounced very differently from the original
English words. If the native Japanese speakers
are able to recognize the differences between
Japanese and English sounds when processing
loanwords, it was expected that their English
knowledge would help to facilitate their cognitive processing for lexical decision of phonetically similar loanwords in the experiment used
© Japanese Psychological Association 2003.

JPR_035.fm Page 78 Monday, February 17, 2003 4:22 PM

78

K. Tamaoka and Y. Miyaoka

in the study. Consequently, as related to theconcept of “interlexical activation,” it was also
assumed that the loanwords which werephonetically similar to the original English words
would be judged as existing Japanese loanwords(a “Yes” response) faster than the counter
stimuli of loanwords which were phoneticallydissimilar. Despite this expectation, the present
study indicated no differences between thereaction times and error rates for lexical decisionof both types of loanwords where a correct“Yes” response was concerned.
Loanwords such as(gift),(trump), and(announce), which
retained much of their original English pronunciation, were judged no faster in lexicaldecisions than loanwords such as(radio),(omelet), and(restaurant),
which have pronunciations dissimilar to their
original English words. This “no influence”
tendency was observed among both loanwords
with high and low frequencies. Therefore, thelack of a phonetic similarity effect for existing loanwords suggests that native Japanese
speakers do not activate lexical representationsof English words while processing Japanese
loanwords adopted from English; at least thephonetic cues of the loanwords do not create
enough activation to make use of the original
English words.
In previous studies (e.g., de Groot, 1992; deGroot, Dannenburg, & van Hell, 1994; Kroll& Stewart, 1994; Sholl, Sankaranarayanan, &Kroll, 1995; Chen, Cheung & Lau, 1997; Cheung& Chen, 1998), the stream of activations for
lexical items from the first language (L1) to thesecond language (L2) (i.e., forward processing
from L1 to L2) was found to be stronger thanin the reverse direction (i.e., backward processing
from L2 to L1). These studies on the directionof activations during translation between two
languages revealed different types of processing of lexical entries in the “asymmetry model”
of the first and second languages. In accordancewith this model, the fact that there was noeffect of phonetic similarity in our study on
lexical decision of loanwords with high andlow frequencies suggests that native Japanese
speakers were able to process loanwords with© Japanese Psychological Association 2003.

little or no activation of lexical representationsof the original English words. Instead, they
just relied on their knowledge from previous
exposure to loanwords in katakana. Thus, thisresult did not support “interlexical activation”
between Japanese and English.
There was, however, evidence from the resultsof the experiment performed in this study
which shows that interlexical activation may
occur when rejecting unadopted loanwords asexisting Japanese loanwords. The lexical decision task using unadopted loanwords incurredmuch longer reaction times and higher error
rates than did both non-words and pseudoloanwords. Because all subjects in the study
were native Japanese speakers, they had seldomor never before seen the unadopted loanwords
in katakana that they had to lexically verify as
existing Japanese loanwords. Thus, in thislexical verification process, subjects may have
had to activate lexical representations of theoriginal English words for the unadopted
loanwords. As a result, this process created an
inhibitory effect. Therefore, not only the slow
processing speed, but also a high error rate of
27.95% for rejecting the unadopted loanwords
also helped support concept of “interlexical
activation.”
There may be an alternative process for
lexical decision of loanwords which do not
involve “interlexical activation.” Subjects may
have used a strategy of rejecting unadopted
loanwords by simply asking themselves whether
they had seen those loanwords in katakana
before. In order to investigate this possibility,
an additional study by questionnaire wasconducted whereby subjects were asked ifthey had seen the 24 unadopted loanwords
in katakana before. Previous exposure to each
unadopted loanword by the subjects turned out
to be 28.54% on average, calculated by the
number of “Yes” answers divided by the totalof 20 subjects for each of the 24 unadopted
loanwords. The correlation between previous
exposure and error rates in lexical decision
was significantly high. Thus, the alternative
explanation of previous exposure to the 24
unadopted loanwords in katakana by subjects
was supported by this result. Therefore, theJPR_035.fm Page 79 Monday, February 17, 2003 4:22 PM

Processing of Japanese loanwords

second concept of a “lexical mental boundary”
was created on the basis of these findings.
The correlation between previous exposure
to unadopted loanwords and reaction times
for lexical decision was nevertheless not highenough to support the “lexical mental boundary”
theory as a sole strategy for lexical decision.
As mentioned before, latency for lexical decision of unadopted loanwords was much longer
than that of non-words and pseudo-loanwords.
Due to the longer latency required for “No”
responses in lexical decision, there is still a
possibility that lexical representations of original
English words were activated in the cognitive
processing of unadopted loanwords. Thus,
although the present study provided strong
evidence that native Japanese speakers utilize
the processing strategy of previous exposure toloanwords in katakana for lexical decisions, inthe process of rejecting unadopted loanwords,
it is quite possible that native Japanese speakers
activate lexical representations of original English words as well.

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(Received April 11, 2000; accepted September 7,
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