1993 年 41 巻 4 号 p. 414-423
Many learners have difficulty in recognizing long vowels (LVs) and double consonants (DCs) in Japanese language. The purposes of this study are to investigate the characteristics of auditory perception of LVs and DCs in Japanese natives and to compare them with those of Chinese students. In the experiment I, 52 Japanese subjects were asked to judge 712 stimuli (human voices processed by a time expansion technique) whether they included LVs or DCs. The results show the threshold values are proportional to the speech speed and their judgements are the stablest in the range of natural speed. In the experiment II, threshold values were measured by the method of limits for four Japanese natives, four Chinese experts in Japanese language, and four Chinese novices. Threshold values in ascending series are longer than those in descending series for Japanese natives and Chinese novices, while the reverse is true for Chinese experts. This result suggests that Chinese experts use the different strategy in perceiving LVs and DCs to attain the same level of performance as Japanese natives.