Is the Four-Character-per-Second Word Limitation Outdated?

JAITS

Research Note

Is the Four-Character-per-Second Word Limitation Outdated?
An Empirical Study of Japanese Film Subtitling
Runa SASAKI(Freelance translator)
Japan has been one of the subtitling countries since the release of the first subtitled film in
1931. However, few studies investigated the now de facto standard of Japanese subtitling, i.e.
the 4 CPS (character per second) rule. This paper examines the appropriateness of this rule
based on eye-tracking experiment on ten graduate students. In the experiment, the participants
watched three different versions of subtitled films, created under 4, 6, and 8 CPS conditions
respectively. A questionnaire was administered afterward to ask the participants about their film
viewing experience in this experiment. The results indicated that a majority of the participantspreferred 6 CPS versions of subtitled films, indicating that the traditional 4 CPS rule may be a
bit outdated for today's audience. The author also conducted interviews with two professional
subtitle translators to seek opinions from practitioners involved in the industry. This paper isbased on my masters’ thesis.

1. Introduction
In recent years, there has been a growing interest in subtitle translation. According to Linde andKay (1999), there are two types of subtitling: intralingual and interlingual. Intralingual
subtitling is for hard-of-hearing people, while interlingual subtitling is for foreign language
films. Interlingual subtitling experts have identified several constraints related to backgroundsounds and visual imagery (e.g. Díaz-Cintas, 2013; Georgakopoulou, 2009; Linde & Kay, 1999;
Tveit, 2009). For interlingual translators, one of the biggest challenges is maintaining a balance
between producing readable subtitles and allowing viewers the experience to enjoy sound andvisual images. As a result, translation strategies are needed in order to make subtitles readable
for all viewers (Pedersen, 2005). Readability of subtitles has been studied using an eye-tracking
tool (e.g. Caffrey, 2012; Schotter & Rayner, 2012). In addition, new technological developments
in subtitling have allowed viewers to become creators of subtitles. Amateur subtitlers can now
SASAKI Runa, “Is the Four-character-per-second Word Limitation Outdated?: An Emprical Studyof Japanese Film Subtitling ,” Interpreting and Translation Studies, No.17, 2017. Pages 149-165. © by
the Japan Association for Interpreting and Translation Studies

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break traditional translation practices and develop new forms of translation. Thus, theenvironment around the subtitling industry has changed.
Japan is a subtitling country where most of the imported films are subtitled. TV programs
imported from abroad are often broadcasted with Japanese subtitles, too. The current rules ofJapanese subtitling were established in 1931 (Toda, 1994) and there have been few studies
investigating this topic. The current study reexamines the appropriateness of the now de facto
rule of Japanese subtitling, i.e. the 4 CPS (character per second)rule, and proposes that thetranslation quality could be improved by expanding this CPS limitation.
2. Background of Research
2.1 Subtitling rules and constraints
Gottlieb (2012) defined subtitling as“diamesic translation in polysemiotic media (including
films, TV, video and DVD) in the form of one or more lines of written text presented on thescreen in sync with the original verbal content”(p. 37). He explained“diamesic”translation as
the type of verbal transfer that crosses over from speech to writing. According to Gottlieb(2012) :The term polysemiotic refers to the fact that in film and TV productions, up to foursemiotic channels are in operation simultaneously: two nonverbal channels (image plus
music & sound effects) and two verbal channels (dialogue, including narration and songs,
plus written pictorial elements) (p. 37).
When watching subtitled movies, viewers have to concentrate on both the subtitles and theimages. According to Díaz-Cintas (2013), subtitle translators have to take into account threeconstraints: spatial, temporal and linguistic. In terms of spatial constraints, subtitles are usuallydisplayed at the bottom of the screen. However, when important pictorial information is shownat the bottom of the screen, subtitles are accordingly moved to the top of the screen (Gottlieb,2012). Since space is limited, a maximum of two subtitle lines per scene are allowed. As for
temporal constraints, subtitles should be displayed on the screen at the precise moment the actor
starts speaking and disappear as soon as the speaking stops. Precise in-and-out timing isessential and subtitles should be in balance with the appropriate reading time setting(Georgakopoulou, 2009). For linguistic constraints, original dialogues are usually reduced inorder to fit the utterance on screen. Depending on the duration of speech, reduction or omission
may be applied partially or totally. These constraints lead to a necessary reduction in the numberof words on the screen (Munday, 2012). The experiment of Linde and Kay (1999) indicated that
subtitles contained 43% less text than the original dialogues. However, this study did notinclude Japanese subtitles. Tveit (2009) pointed out that another lexical constraint is that the150

Is the Four-Character-per-Second Word Limitation Outdated?

spoken words contain dialectal and sociolectal features. In addition to this, ideolectal featuresthat are peculiar to a certain character in the movie could be obstacles for subtitlers (Gottlieb,
1994).
Under these constraints, it is impossible to translate all the original dialogue and subtitlers
have to decide how information or cultural references should be rendered. Ushie and Nishio(2008) noted that generalization, specification and substitution were applied to Japanesesubtitles. These strategies were used in order to reduce the viewer’s cognitive load. Ushie andNishino (2008) pointed out that although the degree of specificity differed between the original
and the subtitles, an equivalent effect was achieved. On the other hand, Shinohara (2013a)
observed that even though subtitlers aimed for readable subtitles, these strategies could confuse
viewers. For instance, she mentioned that due to word limitation, omission was applied to a setof subtitles. It was not possible to translate all of the information from the source language;thus, the subtitler omitted keywords or phrases from one subtitles and added them to the next
frame. According to Shinohara (2013a), viewers may not be satisfied with these subtitles
because the subtitles do not match the original dialogues.
2.2 Japanese subtitling rules and researches
According to the Foreign Film Importer-distributors Association of Japan, the numbers ofsubtitled movies outnumber dubbed films. It is obvious that Japan is a subtitling country andviewers in Japan are familiar to subtitled films. According to Takeda (2013), these subtitles are
created in accordance with the rule of“four characters per second for each frame”.
Furthermore, it can be no more than two lines, with each line containing a maximum of twelve
to thirteen characters. Such rules were established in 1931, when geisha working in Shinbashi,Tokyo, were recruited as participants of a study to investigate how many words-per-second
people can read without too much difficulty (Toda, 1994). The study found that 4 CPS was themost appropriate number and it has become an accepted rule in the subtitling industry sincethen.
On the other hand, a recent survey reported in Shinohara (2013a) suggested that viewers were
not always satisfied with the current subtitling practices. More than half the viewers surveyed
felt dissatisfied with the translation quality even though they preferred subtitles to dubbing.
There has been little research done to reexamine the 4 CPS rule even though younger
audience today appear to have difficulty in reading subtitles and they prefer dubbing to subtitles
and usually do not watch subtitled films (Kagaya, 2010). Still, a large number of people chosesubtitled films for reasons such as wanting to hear the actor's voice and for studying a language(Shinohara, 2013a). In addition to this, Gottlieb (2012) pointed out that the majority of people
spend more time skimming through web-based media for information rather than reading
newspapers and books.
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2.3 Eye-tracking studies
In this section, eye-tracking studies will be reviewed. O’
Brien (2006) noted several drawbacksof eye-tracker, pointing out that whilst modern eye-trackers compensate for head movement,
they are not always accurate and data is lost when participants look away from the screen. On
the other hand, Schotter and Rayner (2012) observed that it is possible to measure eye
movements and exert experimental control in studies to deduce what is happening in the mind.
They also identified two stages of eye movement. One is saccades, which refers to the actual
movements of the eyes. The other is fixation, the period of time when the eyes are relatively
stable. They also discussed Japanese features of subtitling,“When only logographic characters(kanji) are used, the perceptual span is shorter than when mostly syllabic characters (kana) areused (Osaka, 1987), indicating that informational density of the text modulates perceptual span”(Shotter & Rayner, 2012, p. 96). Professional subtitlers are thus known to make use of kanji inorder to decrease the number of characters they use in rendering Japanese subtitles (Shinohara,
2013a).
Caffrey’s (2012) study on viewer perception integrated the use of eye-tracker with a followup questionnaire. In this experiment, he used a Japanese TV animation that introduced“pop-up
gloss”in addition to subtitles. According to Caffrey (2012),“pop-up gloss”refers to notes thatare displayed on screen to explain or comment on culturally marked items appearing in each of
the semiotic channels. From pop-up gloss, participants would be able to understand culturally
marked items. The results suggested that since viewers had further background information,
they would enjoy foreign films more thoroughly. Unfortunately, these types of subtitlingformats are not common in Japan and are not suited for theater-released films because too many
subtitles are displayed successively and viewers end up skipping several subtitles.
Among some of the studies on Japanese subtitles, Kogo and Kishi (1996) found that reading
speed lengthened as the number of characters and subtitle lines increased. The study alsosuggested that viewers can read faster with one-line subtitles than with two-line subtitles even if
the total number of characters is the same. They further observed that the average reading timeby viewers was 51.2 % of the total display time of the subtitles. In other words, the viewers
spent half of the time reading when the subtitles were on the screen. The subtitles used in theirexperiment followed the traditional 4 CPS norm.
2.4 Research questions
Previous studies on subtitle translation did not specifically examine the character number
limitation of Japanese subtitles. As mentioned earlier, it has been nearly half a century since the
now de facto standard of 4 CPS rule of Japanese film subtitling was established. Reading habitsof people have changed since then (Gottlieb, 2012), and so should have the reading speed of theaverage film audience. With such changes in mind, I propose the following two research152

Is the Four-Character-per-Second Word Limitation Outdated?

questions in the present study:
RQ1. Is the current 4 CPS rule of Japanese film subtitling an outdated norm?
RQ2. What is the most appropriate norm of Japanese subtitling in terms of the number ofcharacters per second?
3. Research Method
To explore these questions, an experiment was conducted at a private university in westernJapan to investigate how university students react to subtitled videos prepared under different
conditions as to the number of characters per second.
3.1 Participants
Ten Japanese graduate students (three men and seven women) were recruited for thisexperiment. They are between 20 and 49 years of age, with a half of the participants in their
twenties. All the participants majored in foreign language pedagogy and their English
proficiency was higher than average, with their TOEIC scores ranging from 600 to 980. All theparticipants responded to the questionnaire (cf. Section 3.3) saying that they“often”or“always”watched subtitled movies and preferred subtitle to dubbing when it came to viewing
foreign films.
3.2 Instruments
The film clips used in the experiment were taken from Psycho (1960) directed by Alfred
Hitchcock and Black Swan (2010) by Darren Aronofsky.
In order for the participants to be able to focus on subtitles, the plot of the film should be
easily understood. Historical or documentary films requiring background knowledge tounderstand may negatively affect the readability of subtitles added to such films (Gottlieb,
1994). Minchinton (1993) suggested that viewers could predict the dialogue when they watch
love stories (as cited in Tveit, 2009). Thus, I selected movies whose plots were not predictable
yet require no specific background knowledge to follow the stories being told. Psycho is one of
Hitchcocks’best suspense films, but it is not well-known among young people today. Black
Swan, a relatively new film, belongs to the same genre as that of Psycho. Most of theparticipants had not watched these movies before, except for participant C who had watchedboth movies prior to this experiment.
The extraction of video images and subtitle data including English transcriptions and in-andout timing from DVDs was carried out using free software, DVD Decrypter and Subrip. Three
scenes from each movie were then selected to create short video clips whose length were about
five minutes each. For each video clip, three versions of Japanese subtitle were prepared under153

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different CPS conditions: i.e. 4, 6, and 8 characters per second.
Both 4 CPS and 6 CPS versions contained no more than two lines of subtitle per frame. In thecase of 8 CPS version, however, up to three lines per frame were accepted for the purpose of
capturing eye movements on the unusual amount of subtitles. The translation of English
transcriptions into Japanese subtitles was done by the present author. Although the focus oftranslation was more on quantity rather than quality, the Japanese subtitles were checked by aprofessional translator so that the quality was good enough to conduct this experiment.
3.3 Procedure
Each participant watched six video clips on a 17 inch computer monitor for a total of 30
minutes; three from Psycho and three from Black Swan. The order of the videos watched varied
from person to person. For instance, one participant watched them in narrative order whileothers watched it randomly. The CPS versions were also assigned differently. Viewer perception
was simultaneously captured by Tobii Pro X2-60 eye-tracker. Participants sat 60 cm from thecomputer screen.
For data analysis, I excluded participants who had less than 85% of pupil data in order tomaintain data credibility (Caffrey, 2012). For example, the eye-tracker captured 40 % of eyedata for participant B for the entire video. 60% of the data was lost because the participant
looked away from the computer monitor or the eye-tracker was not able to capture the data. As aresult, seven participants (three men and four women) were left for analysis. People shift theirgaze back and forth between the subtitle and the movie (Schotter & Rayner, 2012). Based on
this analysis, the Areas of Interest (AOIs), which define areas of certain interest provided by
Tobii eye tracker, were used to analyze statistics for eye tracking. Two AOIs,“projected image”
and“subtitles”were created for each video (see Figure 3-1). Scenes which had no subtitles formore than 20 seconds were excluded. In this condition, total visit duration of each AOIs wascounted. Gaze path was also considered in order to analyze characteristics of eye movement. As
Hosaki and Suzuki (1997) suggested, long scenes were not necessary as figures would be
unclear, so 14 second scenes were analyzed.
After watching the videos, participants were asked to fill in a questionnaire containing thefollowing questions:
・Which video clip did you think was the most appropriate? (For each film)
・Were there any problems with the subtitles in terms of the amount of subtitles and translation
quality?
・Which did you concentrate more on: projected images or subtitles? (For each video clip)
・What do you think about the subtitles in general?

154Is the Four-Character-per-Second Word Limitation Outdated?

Figure 3-1. AOIs (Areas of Interests) of projected image and subtitles
4. Results of Experiment
4.1 Questionnaire
The data of questionnaire is used for focusing on translation quality and viewers’opinions ofsubtitles, thus all ten participants’data will be analyzed. Table 4-1 shows the number ofparticipants who concentrated more on the projected images than the subtitles. According to thequestionnaire, eight participants concentrated more on the images when they watched the 4 CPS(characters per second) version of the subtitled video, while two participants spent most of thetime reading subtitles. As the number of CPS increases, participants concentrated more on thesubtitles in case of Psycho. As for Black Swan, however, there was no difference among the three
CPS conditions. Under all conditions, eight out of ten participants answered they concentrated
more on the images. According to the questionnaire, two participants (participants I and J) werebothered by the excessive use of subtitles in the 8 CPS condition, while participant F responded
that there was no reading problem and she felt more subtitles could be added. Participant H feltthat the subtitles of Psycho were relatively long and said she spent most of the time reading
subtitles.
Table 4-1. Participants’concentration on two AOIs (i.e. projected images and subtitles) under
three subtitling conditions (n=10)
Subtitling

PsychoBlack Swan

Condition

image

subtitle

image

subtitle

4 CPS*

8

2

8

2

6 CPS

7

3

8

2

8 CPS

5

5

8

2

*CPS =Characters per second
Figure 4-1 below shows the most appropriate subtitles of Psycho and Black Swan in terms oftranslation quality and amount of subtitles. Participants were asked to choose one video clip that155

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they could enjoy without being bothered by the excessive amount of subtitles and odd
translation. The subtitling conditions were not open to them. In other words, participants chosethe most appropriate subtitles without knowing which CPS condition was applied to each of
them.

6

Participants

5
4
3

Psycho2Black Swan10
4 character
6 character
8 character
Subtitling condition

Figure 4-1. The most appropriate subtitling conditions in terms of quality and quantity (n=9)
As seen in Figure 4-1, the majority of participants chose the 6 CPS versions as the best
subtitles in both movies. Participant C did not notice any significant differences or incongruity
among the subtitles created under different CPS conditions. According to the questionnaire, she
had watched both films before, so she was familiar with the stories. For this reason, sheprobably did not need to read the subtitles. Therefore only nine out of ten valid responses could
be extracted from this experiment. Regarding quality issues, participant D wrote that thesubtitles of Black Swan were more faithfully translated than that of Psycho. Participant H also
felt that the subtitles of Black Swan were more natural, while that of Psycho were more likestraight translation. Regarding quantity of subtitles, some students had difficulty in reading the 8
CPS subtitles as mentioned above.
4.2 Participants’ comments
Besides subtitles in the experiment, participants expressed their thoughts about subtitles ingeneral. Three participants (participants C, E, and G) explained the kinds of subtitles which
could be an obstacle in reading. Participant C responded that a complicated story can hinder thereading of subtitles. She also commented that the combination of horizontal and verticalsubtitles was sometimes hard to read. Participant C did not feel any partiality with a specific156

Is the Four-Character-per-Second Word Limitation Outdated?

subtitling condition or format. In addition, participant G, who chose the 8 CPS version for
Psycho and 6 CPS version for Black Swan as the most appropriate subtitles, said,“Byconcentrating too much on subtitles, I would miss the images so I tended to read subtitles
quickly.”Participant E answered that while he preferred subtitles, he would occasionallywatched dubbing when he got tired of reading subtitles. He chose the 6 CPS versions for bothmovies as the best subtitle renditions. As an English learner, participant F commented that hehabitually tries not to read subtitles in order to improve language skills. He chose the 8 CPS
version for Psycho and the 4 CPS version for Black Swan. Furthermore, another learner(participant D) mentioned,“subtitles can help understand the story, but they become obstacles if
I can understand English.”She chose the 8 and 6 CPS versions for Psycho and Black Swan
respectively. Participant J said,“I usually depend on subtitles and do not pay attention to theoriginal spoken dialogue so much. But Japanese subtitles support listening and understanding ofEnglish dialogues.”She chose the 6 CPS subtitles for both films. Two participants complained
about traditional subtitles. Participant A, who chose the 6 CPS version for Psycho and the 8 CPS
version for Black Swan as the most appropriate subtitles, commented that many subtitles weretranslated oddly and spoiled the original movie. Another student (participant H) said,“Japanesesubtitles convey less information than the original dialogue, so I try to watch English subtitles.”Participant H chose the 4 CPS version for Psycho and the 6 CPS version for Black Swan. The
results echo Shinohara’s survey (2013a), which suggested viewers are not always satisfied withthe subtitles created under the 4 CPS condition.
4.3 Eye-tracking data
Tables 4-2 and 4-3 show the ratio in percentage of the total time spent by each participant onviewing subtitles vs. projected image (non-subtitles area). Table 4-2 shows results of Psycho andTable 4-3 shows those of Black Swan. The numbers in brackets next to the 6 and 8 CPS totals
show the difference against the 4 CPS subtitled videos.
Participants spent longer times reading subtitles in the 8 CPS condition. For example,
participant E spent 62% of the viewing time on the image for the 4 CPS version of Psycho. In
the case of the 6 CPS version, however, the total visit duration of the image was 17% less thanthat of the 4 CPS version. Both the longest and the shortest total visit duration of each subtitle
rule were captured by women in their twenties (participants A and J) even though their English
levels were roughly the same (over 800 with TOEIC score). On the whole, total visit duration ofsubtitles of Black Swan was shorter than that of Psycho. As discussed before, participants foundthe translation quality of Black Swan better. In addition, the average speed of dialogues was
faster in Psycho (153 wpm) than Black Swan (145 wpm). These factors probably led to shorter
reading times. The average reading time of subtitles for the experiment was 36.3 %.
A Wilcoxon signed-rank test was carried out in order to compare the differences between the157

『通訳翻訳研究』17 号（2017）

traditional 4 CPS norm and the two other conditions. The significance level for this experiment
was set at 0.05. As for Psycho, there was no significant difference between the 4 and 6 CPS
subtitles (z = -1.7, p = .089, r = .12). Note that z indicates test statistics, p shows p-value and rrefers to effect size. In the case of 8 CPS subtitles, however, the result was significant (z = -2.37,
p = .018, r = .169), indicating that participants spent more time on reading subtitles thanwatching the projected images compared to the 4 CPS version. On the other hand, there was no
significant difference among three subtitled videos in Black Swan (for 6 CPS, (z = -.17, p =.0865, r = .02) and for 8 CPS (z = -1.693, p = .090, r = .12)).
Table 4-2. Total visit duration (ratio in percentage) of subtitles and image for Psycho (n=7)
4 CPS

6 CPS
Image

8 CPS

Participant

Image

Subtitle

Subtitle

Image

Subtitle

A

78

22

81 (+3)19 (-3)76 (-2)24 (+2)E

62

38

40 (-22)

60 (+22)45 (-17)55 (+17)

F

66

34

70 (+4)30 (-4)42 (-24)

58 (+24)

G

71

29

54 (-17)46 (+17)61 (-10)39 (+10)

H

55

45

47 (-8)53 (+8)48 (-7)52 (+7)I

68

32

64 (-4)36 (+4)67 (-1)33 (+1)J

50

50

46 (-4)54 (+4)35 (-15)

65 (+15)

Average

64.3

35.7

57.4 (-6.9)

42.6 (+6.9)

53 (-11.3)

47 (+11.3)

Note. Participants B, C, and D were excluded due to the scarcity of pupil data.
Table 4-3. Total visit duration (ratio in percentage) of subtitles and image for Black Swan (n=7)
4 CPS

6 CPS
Image

8 CPS

Participant

Image

Subtitle

Image

Subtitle

A

89

11

85 (-4)15 (+4)

Subtitle

76 (-13)24 (+13)

E

62

38

58 (-4)42 (+4)68 (+6)32 (-6)F

67

33

71 (+4)29 (-4)68 (+1)32 (-1)G

71

29

77 (+6)23 (-6)61 (-10)39 (+10)

H

68

32

76 (+8)24 (-8)65 (-3)35 (+3)I

79

21

74 (-5)26 (+5)69 (-10)31 (+10)

J

66

34

56 (-10)44 (+10)44 (-22)56 (+22)

average

71.7

28.3

71 (-0.7)

29 (+0.7)

64.4 (-7.3)

35.6 (+7.3)

Note. Participants B, C, and D were excluded due to the scarcity of pupil data.
Taking a closer look at eye-tracking data, Figures 4-2 to 4-4 below show the gaze plot of eachsubtitling condition. They included four subtitles and the duration of the scene was 14 seconds.
Bigger circles indicate longer fixation time. Fixation counts of each subtitling rule were 41 for 4
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Is the Four-Character-per-Second Word Limitation Outdated?

CPS, 51 for 6 CPS, and 59 for 8 CPS respectively. More texts led to more fixation counts andlonger reading time. As can be seen, eyes moved to image only twice out of 51 counts in 8 CPS
subtitles.
Considering total visit duration, participants did not have enough time to enjoy the videos
when they were exposed to the 8 CPS subtitle of Psycho. With regard to Black Swan, however,no significant difference among the three subtitling conditions was observed. Based on theanalysis of gaze plot, participants seemed to spend too much time reading the 8 CPS subtitles of
Psycho. The results imply that the subtitles of 8 CPS condition are too long.

Figure 4-2. Gaze plot (four subtitles): 4 CPS condition

Figure 4-3. Gaze Plot (four subtitles): 6 CPS condition

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Figure 4-4. Gaze Plot (four subtitles): 8 CPS condition
5. Discussion
The 4 CPS condition is the current norm of the industry. Indeed, it is feasible to translate under
this norm without veering off from the original dialogue. In addition, eye-tracking data showedthat participants had plenty of time for both watching the projected images and reading
subtitles. However, the participants of the current experiment were not fully satisfied with the 4
CPS rule of Japanese subtitle in terms of translation quality, echoing the previous study(Shinohara, 2013a). The number of participants who chose it as the most appropriate subtitle
norm was the smallest among three experimental conditions.
The results of questionnaire suggested that the 8 CPS condition could also be enjoyable.
However, the eye-tracking data showed that participants concentrated too much on reading
subtitles under this condition, particularly when three-line subtitles were displayed. According
to Shinohara (2013a), subtitlers aim at creating subtitles that can be readable andcomprehensible for all the viewers and subtitles should not attract too much attention of theaudience. Georgakopolou (2009) suggested the similar point, saying that the most successful
subtitles are those that are not noticed by the viewer. Therefore, it can be concluded that the 8
CPS condition is not suitable because participants appeared to spend too much time on reading
subtitles.
The number of participants who chose the 6 CPS condition as the most appropriate subtitlingstandard is the largest in the experiment. Eye tracking data (gaze plot) suggested that under thiscondition participants had enough time to watch the projected images. Furthermore, reading
subtitles seemed not as difficult as the 8 CPS version. Since no participants complained abouttranslation quality, it can be said that the 6 CPS condition is probably a strong candidate for a
new CPS standard of Japanese subtitle.

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6. Interviews with Professional Subtitle Translators
The results of the experiment imply that the current 4 CPS norm of Japanese subtitle may not beappropriate to viewers who are proficient at reading subtitles. To gain further insight frompeople involved in the industry, however, I interviewed two professional subtitle translators.
Translator A (interviewed on July 30, 2016) discussed her views on translation rules
including the 4 CPS industry norm based on her ten years of experience. I explained her that myresearch suggested people could watch 6 CPS subtitles without being bothered by the amount of
subtitles. She said:
As far as I know, there has not been a movement for examining the current rule, nor have I
never doubted it. It is true that small segments of the population prefer dubbing due to thefact that difficult logographic characters (kanji) or idioms prevent understanding of thestory, particularly if the plot of the movie is complicated. On the other hand, those viewers
who have advanced English skill can read faster than ordinary people, so they could
comprehend more text.
Relating to the translation quality, I asked;“Have you ever felt that it could be moreconvenient if you could use more characters; for instance, one or two more kana-kanji
characters in your Japanese subtitles?”She answered:
There would be not much difference even if one or two characters per second wereincreased. Technically, it is possible to add one character by changing in-and-out timing;
however, it is not encouraged and usually the duration is not affected.
Working also as a proof reader, she said these manipulations would not be allowed and would
be revised. She continued:
Movies themselves are complete and impeccable works, so subtitles should be minimal.
Viewers feel frustration if subtitles are not readable in the time they are displayed. Subtitles
that require viewers to concentrate too much on reading are not desirable. Otherwise, some
important information of the movie may be missed.
In short, Translator A believes the current 4 CPS norm is appropriate. In contrast, Translator
B (interviewed on August 29, 2016), who has been working as a subtitler for 28 years, had adifferent view:Firstly, subtitlers should translate original dialogues without considering word limitation. If161

『通訳翻訳研究』17 号（2017）

necessary, they can consider which parts or information need omitting or should remain.
The cases when omission occurs are usually when actors speak fast or when there is plentyof information to take in.
I asked Translator B the same question regarding translation quality – whether morecharacters were needed when producing subtitles. She answered:
For a more refined translation, I would only use more characters in order to avoid
unfinished fragments such as kare wa naniwo? (What is he (doing)?) These are“conventional subtitles”. A viewer mentioned this to me at one time.
According to her, this is based on the fact that more people can understand English nowadays
compared to the past.“Conventional subtitles”refer to“unfinished sentences andgrammatically unacceptable constructions”(Gottlieb, 1994). Since she mentioned viewers, I
asked another question: Can you get opinions from spectators about your work?
No, I do not surf the Internet where I may get opinions of spectators because not many
opinions are constructive. It is possible that viewers feel that subtitles are not translated
properly when what they hear does not appear in subtitles, so they perceive those subtitles
as meaningless. As a professional subtitler, it is more important to respond to the demands
of production companies. There is no use if production companies or clients are
dissatisfied with subtitles.
I explained the result of my experiment that participants could comprehend more text, andthat my research stood in contrast to Kagaya (2010) which suggested that young people seemed
to have difficulty in reading subtitles. Translator B responded:
Viewers can read more text if they try to, and I believe those people who prefer subtitledfilms are more trained and can read faster as they have been reading subtitles for many
years. However, subtitlers have to take into account those elderly people who may get tired
reading subtitles for a long time.
In short, Translator B did not completely agree with the current 4 CPS norm. Nevertheless,both Translators A and B are striving to produce clear and readable subtitles for all viewers
under the current 4 CPS industry standard.

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7. Conclusion
The 4 CPS Japanese subtitling norm was established in 1931. Since then a large number offoreign films were subtitled under this norm. However, few studies investigated on theappropriateness of this norm. In this study, two research questions were explored. The
followings are summaries of my answers to these research questions:
RQ1. Is the current 4 CPS rule of Japanese film subtitling an outdated norm?
The current 4 CPS rule may be a bit outdated for today's audience, although it is not entirely sobecause original messages could be, and have been, translated properly even under this norm.
Although Kagaya (2010) pointed out that young people had difficulty in reading subtitles thesedays, the participants in this study could enjoy watching subtitled films. When they watched 4
CPS subtitles, they had more time to concentrate on visual images. However, they felt that partof the original dialogue had been omitted. Data showed that viewers were not always satisfied
with subtitles produced under the 4 CPS norm. Translation strategies applied in the subtitles
used in the experiment were mostly generalization, paraphrase, and omission (Pedersen, 2005).
RQ2. What is the most appropriate norm of Japanese subtitling in terms of the number ofcharacters per second?
As for Research Question 2, it was suggested that 6 CPS could be an optional choice. As
Translator B suggested, translation quality could be improved if more characters were allowed
to use. Also, more translation strategies can be applied and a greater variety of subtitles can beproduced. In our experiment, participants spent most of the time reading subtitles when they
were exposed to 8 CPS versions of subtitled movie. Georgakopolou (2009) suggested that themost successful subtitles are those not noticed by the viewer. The 8 CPS versions of subtitles,
however, required too much attention of the viewers and therefore are considered inappropriate.
In case of 6 CPS subtitles, all the participants could enjoy watching the films without being
bothered by subtitles. Also, the participants were generally satisfied with the quality oftranslation under the 6 CPS condition. These results imply that both translators and audience
could benefit if 6 CPS, with a degree of flexibility, was adopted as a new standard of Japanesesubtitling.
8. Limitations and Future Studies
The sample size of the experiment was not large enough to generalize the findings. Due to time
limitations, eye-tracking data was captured from only ten participants. A broader selection ofage groups, including elderly people and small children, is necessary for future studies. The
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English level of the participants was higher than the average, and this possibly led to deeper
awareness of translation quality. Low level English learners or those who do not have richlexical knowledge may not find omission of the original dialogue in the 4 CPS subtitles. In
addition, films used in the experiment were of only one genre. Studies incorporating other film
genres might result in different reactions from the experimental subjects.
All in all, the current study has clear limitations and one must be very cautious in making any
generalizations from its findings. Nevertheless, the author hopes that the current study shedsome new light on this relatively neglected area of inquiry.
Acknowledgement: This paper is based on the author's MA thesis submitted to the Graduate Schoolof Foreign Language Education and Research, Kansai University, in January 2017. The author wishes
to express her heartfelt appreciation to her supervisor, Professor Yasumasa Someya and Professor
Masaru Yamada for their generous support and valuable advice without which this paper would nothave been possible. The author would also like to show her gratitude to Shoko Toyokura for help withthe experiment and comments that improved subtitle translation.

About the author
SASAKI Runa received master’s degree in Foreign Language Research and Education, Kansai
University. Her current research interests include subtitle translation.

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