Effects of Mnemonics on Immediate and Delayed Recalls of Hiragana by Learners of Japanese as a Foreign Language

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  • ひらがな導入時の連想法が及ぼす短期・長期的学習効果

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Abstract

This paper reports a study which investigated the short-term and long-term effects of picture and sound mnemonics on remembering hiragana by learners of Japanese as a foreign language (FL). The study tested two hypotheses. One was that FL learners of Japanese, with or without prior experience in learning non-Roman scripts as their L1, would not benefit from the picture-plus-sound mnemonics on the immediate recall test. The other was that those learners without such experience (the Roman group) would benefit from these mnemonics on the delayed recall test while those learners with such experience (the non-Roman group) would not benefit. In this study, 66 beginning learners of Japanese at an American university participated in four computer-generated tutorial sessions of 40 hiragana. In each session, one of the four sets of ten hiragana was introduced in one of the four teaching methods:(a) picture and sound mnemonics (P + S), (b) picture mnemonics (P), (c) sound mnemonics (S), and (d) flash cards (F). Each session consisted of (a) a learning phase, (b) a review phase, and (c) a self-test phase. Each session was followed immediately by an oral interview and by recall tests two to five days later. The analyses of valid data from 50 participants on the self-test half supported the first hypothesis; the P + S method was effective only for the Roman group. The analyses of valid data from 45 participants on the delayed recall test also half supported the second hypothesis; the P + S method was not effective for either group. The results from both tests are discussed in relation to a previous study (Quackenbush, Nakajo, Nagatomo, and Tawada, 1989) and transfer of L1 script recognition strategies (Chikamatsu, 1996; Koda, 1989; Mori, 1998). In addition, an observation is made as to why the P + S method was effective, and future studies are suggested.

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