The Perception of Japanese Consonant Length by Native Malay Speakers

MOHD HILMI HAMZAH; KIMIKO TSUKADA; JOHN HAJEK

doi:10.17576/gema-2026-2603-16

The Perception of Japanese Consonant Length by Native Malay Speakers

MOHD HILMI HAMZAH, KIMIKO TSUKADA, JOHN HAJEK

Abstract

The present study investigated how the consonant length contrast in Japanese (i.e., word-medial singletons vs. word-medial geminates) was perceived by native Malay speakers according to previous first language (L1) familiarity with such a contrast. The participants were Kedah Malay [KDM (-quantity)] and Kelantan Malay [KLM (+quantity)] speakers who differed in terms of their familiarity with quantity systems. That is, the KDM (-quantity) speakers were unfamiliar with the length contrast, while the KLM (+quantity) speakers were familiar with the length contrast. Neither group had experience with Japanese. Consonant length is contrastive in both Japanese and KLM (+quantity). However, the two languages are different with respect to word position. That is, consonant length in Japanese is only allowed to contrast word-medially, while the length contrast only occurs word-initially in KLM (+quantity). Therefore, we were theoretically interested in observing how the two groups of native Malay speakers, who had different L1 experience with respect to consonant length, perceived the word-medial contrast in Japanese. We tested the degree to which these two Malay groups as well as the control native Japanese (NJ) group perceived the Japanese length contrast by conducting an AXB discrimination task and instructing the participants to respond to 200 trials. The results revealed that the NJ speakers scored the highest accuracy (99%), followed by the KLM (+quantity) (84%) and then KDM (-quantity) (82%) speakers. It appears that the NJ speakers outperformed the two Malay groups. Surprisingly, both Malay groups performed about equally well. There was somehow an additional benefit for the KLM (+quantity) speakers who were exposed to consonant length in their L1, with the clearest effect for the discrimination of alveolar geminates. The results provide some evidence for L1 influence on cross-linguistic geminate perception, albeit without Japanese experience. It is anticipated that the results will also inform pedagogical approaches for developing listening comprehension and communicative proficiency in the Japanese language.

Keywords: Consonant length; length contrast; Japanese; Kedah Malay; Kelantan Malay

Kajian ini meneliti bagaimana kontras kepanjangan konsonan dalam bahasa Jepun (iaitu konsonan tunggal berbanding konsonan geminat pada kedudukan tengah perkataan) dipersepsikan oleh penutur asli bahasa Melayu berdasarkan tahap pendedahan awal bahasa ibunda (L1) mereka terhadap kontras tersebut. Peserta kajian terdiri daripada penutur dialek Melayu Kedah [KDM (-kuantiti)] dan Melayu Kelantan [KLM (+kuantiti)] yang berbeza dari segi kelaziman mereka terhadap sistem kuantiti. Secara khususnya, penutur KDM (-kuantiti) tidak terbiasa dengan kontras kepanjangan, manakala penutur KLM (+kuantiti) lazim dengan kontras kepanjangan tersebut. Kedua-dua kumpulan tidak mempunyai sebarang pengalaman berbahasa Jepun. Kepanjangan konsonan bersifat kontrastif dalam kedua-dua bahasa Jepun dan KLM (+kuantiti). Walau bagaimanapun, kedua-dua bahasa ini berbeza dari aspek kedudukan dalam perkataan. Hal ini bermakna, kepanjangan konsonan dalam bahasa Jepun hanya berkontras pada kedudukan tengah perkataan, manakala kontras kepanjangan hanya berlaku pada kedudukan awal perkataan dalam KLM (+kuantiti). Oleh itu, dari sudut teori, kajian ini bertujuan untuk memerhatikan bagaimana kedua-dua kumpulan penutur asli bahasa Melayu yang mempunyai pengalaman L1 yang berbeza berkaitan kepanjangan konsonan, mempersepsikan kontras pada kedudukan tengah perkataan dalam bahasa Jepun. Kami menguji tahap persepsi kedua-dua kumpulan bahasa Melayu tersebut serta kumpulan kawalan penutur asli bahasa Jepun (NJ) terhadap kontras kepanjangan bahasa Jepun melalui pelaksanaan tugas diskriminasi AXB. Dalam tugas ini, peserta diarahkan untuk memberikan tindak balas terhadap 200 rangsangan. Dapatan kajian mendedahkan bahawa penutur NJ mencatatkan kadar ketepatan tertinggi (99%), diikuti oleh penutur KLM (+kuantiti) (84%) dan kemudiannya penutur KDM (-kuantiti) (82%). Jelas terbukti bahawa prestasi penutur NJ mengatasi kedua-dua kumpulan penutur bahasa Melayu tersebut. Walau bagaimanapun, satu dapatan yang mengejutkan adalah kedua-dua kumpulan penutur bahasa Melayu menunjukkan tahap prestasi yang hampir sama. Namun begitu, wujud kelebihan tambahan bagi penutur KLM (+kuantiti) yang telah terdedah kepada kepanjangan konsonan dalam L1 mereka, dengan kesan yang paling ketara dapat dilihat pada diskriminasi konsonan gusi panjang. Dapatan ini menyumbangkan bukti untuk pengaruh L1 terhadap persepsi geminat rentas bahasa, walaupun tanpa sebarang pengalaman dengan bahasa Jepun. Hasil kajian ini dijangka dapat memberikan panduan kepada pendekatan pedagogi dalam usaha memperkembangkan kemahiran kefahaman mendengar dan kecekapan komunikatif dalam bahasa Jepun.

Kata kunci: Kepanjangan konsonan; kontras kepanjangan; bahasa Jepun; bahasa Melayu Kedah; bahasa Melayu Kelantan

Keywords

Consonant length; length contrast; Japanese; Kedah Malay; Kelantan Malay

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DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17576/gema-2026-2603-16