The sensitivity of native Japanese speakers to On and Kun kanji readings

Abstract

Japanese kanji reading can be divided into two types: On-readings, derived from the original Chinese pronunciation and Kun-readings, originating from the Japanese pronunciation. Kanji that are normally given an On-reading around 50% of the time were presented in a context of other kanji that had either a highly dominant On-reading or a highly dominant Kun-reading. The reading that was given in this experiment was very much biased toward the type of phonological environment in which it was embedded. So native Japanese speakers easily shifted between On and Kun readings, depending on phonological context, suggesting that separate On and Kun sub-lexica exist within the phonological lexicon.