2022 Volume 20 Pages 33-56
To investigate similarities and differences between native and nonnative lexical processing, lexical decision and naming performance of 333 English words for Japanese university students were compared with those for native English speakers in the English Lexicon Project (Balota et al., 2007). Both lexical decision and naming performance significantly correlated between Japanese learners and native speakers. Several variables that significantly correlated with lexical decision and naming speed for both Japanese learners and native speakers were found. Notable differences between learners and native speakers were found. First, for Japanese learners, lexical decision was faster than naming. Second, Japanese learners produced errors affected by the knowledge of romaji and errors that do not conform to English spelling-sound correspondence patterns. Implications for second/foreign language lexical processing research and English language education in Japan are discussed.
