Characteristics of Event-related Potentials in Recognition Processes of Japanese Kanji and Sentences for Chinese Bilinguals

Abstract

This paper investigates the recognition process of Japanese kanji and sentences for Chinese bilinguals and Native Japanese speakers (NJS), by analyzing the event-related potential (ERP) differences between the two groups while they visually recognized Japanese kanji and sentences. The results showed that no significant differences were found between the two groups while they recognized Japanese kanji, but significant differences were found in the Japanese sentences condition. The results demonstrated that the neural mechanisms of recognition processes of Japanese sentences including kana between the two groups were not identical. When recognizing ambiguous sentences, Chinese bilinguals' P600 only appeared over the right frontal lobe, reflecting that syntactic integration and revision of ambiguous sentences for Chinese bilinguals was related with the right hemisphere. The results showed, for Chinese bilinguals, the difficulty of Japanese language learning was the recognition and understanding of Japanese sentences with kana, not Japanese kanji. We would like to provide a scientific learning method for Chinese bilinguals to enhance their Japanese language learning efficiency from the aspect of brain science.