Percepraul and Motor Skills, 1979, 48, 917-918.
@ Perceptual and Motor Skills 1979
DIFFERENCES I N LATERALITY FOR RECOGNITION OF NONVERBAL MATERIAL BY JAPANESE A N D ENGLISH SUBJECTS1 TAKESHI HATTA Osaka University of Education
S u m m a ~ y . 4 b s e r v e d differences in hemispheric dominance of visual function, attributed to culturally based experience of Japanese and American subjects, need systematic exploration.
Although the merits of investigation of the cultural influences on laterality differences of cerebral function have been pointed out, it is not so easy to locate these studies. Orbach ( 3 ) exposed English and Hebrew words to native Jewish subjects and found that all identified English words better in the right visual field, while identification of Hebrew words did not differ between visual fields. Lateral differences in Spanish-English bilinguals suggested that less unilaterality of verbal function for bilinguals was noted than for monolinguals ( 5 ) . These studies strongly suggest a cultural effect on differences in lateraliry of cerebral function. The present preliminary experiment examined the differences in laterality of recognition of non-verbal materials between Japanese and English subjects who satisfied the necessary conditions of a cross-cultural comparison. Right-handed native English students ( 15 females and 15 males) from University College, Cardiff, whose ages ranged 17 to 25 yr. and native Japanese students (15 females and 15 males, aged from 20 to 25 yr.) from Osaka University of Education participated. Stimuli were 15 kinds of small circles which contained two different apertures. These stimuli were presented via a twochannel tachistoscope to the left or right visual Field. Each stimulus was exposed to both visual fields in a randomized order. The stimuli, the sites of the entire visual fields, and the luminances of the lighted screens were the same in both experiments. The task of the subjects was to identify the exposed stimulus from the recognition panel of 24 choices. English students showed 44.03% correct responses in the left visual field and 32.98% in the right visual field, while Japanese students obtained 45.66% correct identification in the left visual field and 43.75% in the right visual field. An analysis of variance indicated that the performance levels of both = 1.91) and the left visual-field score was better groups did not differ (F1,58 lPart of this study was conducted at University College. Cardiff, while the author was an overseas research fellow supported by the Ministry of Education of Japan. Special thanks are ex~ressedto Dr. S. I. Dimond. Reprint requests should be sent to T. Hatta. ~ e p a i m e n tdf Psychology. 0s&a University of' ~ducatibn,43 Minarnikawahoricho, ~ e o : noji-ku, Osaka City, 543 Japan.
The interaction of groups of subjects by visual ( F 1 , S 8 = 7.72, p < .01). fields was significant (F1,58= 5.59, p < .05). This implies that English students showed strong advantage of the left visual field but Japanese students showed symmetrical results. Tsunoda (4) proposed cross-cultural differences in hemispheric dominance of auditory function between Japanese and Western subjects. Hatta ( 2 ) also suggested that Japanese might have more bilaterality of cerebral function than Western subjects and hypothesized fluidity or inconsistency of cerebral dominance of Japanese. Although Endo, et al. (1) proposed the same interhemispheric functional asymmetry between Japanese and Western subjects, present results strongly suggest differences in cerebral asymmetry between Japanese and Western subjects and suggest the possibility of cultural influences upon functional interhemispheric asymmetry. Further systematic study now merits consideration. REFERENCES 1. ENDO, M., SHIMIZU,A., & HORI, T. Functional asymmetry of visual fields for Japanese words in Kana writing and random shape recognition in Japanese subjects. Neuropsychologia, 1978, 16, 291-297. 2. HATTA, T. Recognition of Japanese Kanji and Hirakana in the left and right visual fields. Japanese Psychological Research, 1978, 20, 51-59. 3. ORBACH,J. Differentia1 recognition of Hebrew and English words in right and left visual fields as a function of cerebral dominance and reading habits. Neuropsychologia, 1967, 5, 127-134. 4. TSUNODA. T. [Brain and language.] In T. Tsunoda, Y. Tanaka, S. Omori, & N. Sawada (Eds.), [Langicage, consciousness and life.] Tokyo: Kyoritsu-shuppan, 1977. (Japanese) 5. WALTERS, J., & ZATORRB, R. Laterality differences for words identification in bilinguals. Brain and Language, 1978, 6 , 158-167.
Accepted May 11, 1979.
@ Perceptual and Motor Skills 1979
DIFFERENCES I N LATERALITY FOR RECOGNITION OF NONVERBAL MATERIAL BY JAPANESE A N D ENGLISH SUBJECTS1 TAKESHI HATTA Osaka University of Education
S u m m a ~ y . 4 b s e r v e d differences in hemispheric dominance of visual function, attributed to culturally based experience of Japanese and American subjects, need systematic exploration.
Although the merits of investigation of the cultural influences on laterality differences of cerebral function have been pointed out, it is not so easy to locate these studies. Orbach ( 3 ) exposed English and Hebrew words to native Jewish subjects and found that all identified English words better in the right visual field, while identification of Hebrew words did not differ between visual fields. Lateral differences in Spanish-English bilinguals suggested that less unilaterality of verbal function for bilinguals was noted than for monolinguals ( 5 ) . These studies strongly suggest a cultural effect on differences in lateraliry of cerebral function. The present preliminary experiment examined the differences in laterality of recognition of non-verbal materials between Japanese and English subjects who satisfied the necessary conditions of a cross-cultural comparison. Right-handed native English students ( 15 females and 15 males) from University College, Cardiff, whose ages ranged 17 to 25 yr. and native Japanese students (15 females and 15 males, aged from 20 to 25 yr.) from Osaka University of Education participated. Stimuli were 15 kinds of small circles which contained two different apertures. These stimuli were presented via a twochannel tachistoscope to the left or right visual Field. Each stimulus was exposed to both visual fields in a randomized order. The stimuli, the sites of the entire visual fields, and the luminances of the lighted screens were the same in both experiments. The task of the subjects was to identify the exposed stimulus from the recognition panel of 24 choices. English students showed 44.03% correct responses in the left visual field and 32.98% in the right visual field, while Japanese students obtained 45.66% correct identification in the left visual field and 43.75% in the right visual field. An analysis of variance indicated that the performance levels of both = 1.91) and the left visual-field score was better groups did not differ (F1,58 lPart of this study was conducted at University College. Cardiff, while the author was an overseas research fellow supported by the Ministry of Education of Japan. Special thanks are ex~ressedto Dr. S. I. Dimond. Reprint requests should be sent to T. Hatta. ~ e p a i m e n tdf Psychology. 0s&a University of' ~ducatibn,43 Minarnikawahoricho, ~ e o : noji-ku, Osaka City, 543 Japan.
The interaction of groups of subjects by visual ( F 1 , S 8 = 7.72, p < .01). fields was significant (F1,58= 5.59, p < .05). This implies that English students showed strong advantage of the left visual field but Japanese students showed symmetrical results. Tsunoda (4) proposed cross-cultural differences in hemispheric dominance of auditory function between Japanese and Western subjects. Hatta ( 2 ) also suggested that Japanese might have more bilaterality of cerebral function than Western subjects and hypothesized fluidity or inconsistency of cerebral dominance of Japanese. Although Endo, et al. (1) proposed the same interhemispheric functional asymmetry between Japanese and Western subjects, present results strongly suggest differences in cerebral asymmetry between Japanese and Western subjects and suggest the possibility of cultural influences upon functional interhemispheric asymmetry. Further systematic study now merits consideration. REFERENCES 1. ENDO, M., SHIMIZU,A., & HORI, T. Functional asymmetry of visual fields for Japanese words in Kana writing and random shape recognition in Japanese subjects. Neuropsychologia, 1978, 16, 291-297. 2. HATTA, T. Recognition of Japanese Kanji and Hirakana in the left and right visual fields. Japanese Psychological Research, 1978, 20, 51-59. 3. ORBACH,J. Differentia1 recognition of Hebrew and English words in right and left visual fields as a function of cerebral dominance and reading habits. Neuropsychologia, 1967, 5, 127-134. 4. TSUNODA. T. [Brain and language.] In T. Tsunoda, Y. Tanaka, S. Omori, & N. Sawada (Eds.), [Langicage, consciousness and life.] Tokyo: Kyoritsu-shuppan, 1977. (Japanese) 5. WALTERS, J., & ZATORRB, R. Laterality differences for words identification in bilinguals. Brain and Language, 1978, 6 , 158-167.
Accepted May 11, 1979.
