Japanese versus English reading speeds

[sanufi]

Which language would be faster to read with, English or Japanese; assuming equal proficiency in both languages on the readers part? "Reading" being mental reading as opposed to reading out loud. Naturally, comprehension of the reading is a given.

[Noah Bayless]

My uneducated guess is that it's about the same. Proficient English readers read word by word, rather than letter by letter, and my guess is that the same goes for Japanese. But I wonder if any studies have been published about this?

[wccrawford]

I've heard arguments about this before and it usually ends up that nobody knows, which probably means that neither is faster.

As Noah noted, you don't read letter by letter, but word by word. In fact, you brain goes by the shape of the word and not the individual letters... Assuming you already know the word well.

[mieth]

apparently for english if the first and last letters are in the same position no matter how you mix up the letters in between you are able to read at the same speed. As far as kanji is concerned there are those people who say owwww I just see the kanji and I immediately understand the meaning. wow kanji is so convenient. I then follow up by saying... umm and how many years did it take you to learn kanji? ummmm 10? conversation over. Ultimately it is just a necessary evil.. or should I say unnecessary evil to learning this language and ultimately it doesnt matter.

[QuackingShoe]

apparently for english if the first and last letters are in the same position no matter how you mix up the letters in between you are able to read at the same speed. As far as kanji is concerned there are those people who say owwww I just see the kanji and I immediately understand the meaning. wow kanji is so convenient. I then follow up by saying... umm and how many years did it take you to learn kanji? ummmm 10? conversation over. Ultimately it is just a necessary evil.. or should I say unnecessary evil to learning this language and ultimately it doesnt matter.

It's just a trade-off. Kanji have numerous advantages. For instance, I encountered the word 誇大妄想 the other day, and though I'd never seen it before, I was able to tell what it meant immediately, even outside of any context. That's a lot more than you can say for the English word 'meglomania.' However, I can only recognize it immediately because I did go through all of the trouble of learning all of the standard kanji already, which shouldn't be discounted. So, it's something of an up-front investment for a long-term advantage. English has no similar up-front requirements (unless you want to learn both Latin and German first), but also very little word transparency later on. Especially since the kanji do not, in fact, take 10 years (or anything even close to that) to learn, I'm usually inclined to call it a net-advantage. I think it actually makes the language on the whole much easier, rather than harder. That doesn't mean they're not hard; just that the ease that results from them is greater than the difficulty in acquiring them.

[wccrawford]

apparently for english if the first and last letters are in the same position no matter how you mix up the letters in between you are able to read at the same speed.

Actually, this has been debunked. It turns out, it -does- matter the order. There are certain internal orderings (even keeping the first and last letter in place) that make it so you can't read the word. Someone took that same paragraph that's so famous and reordered it so it wasn't possible to read like that.

[Belton]

For instance, I encountered the word 誇大妄想 the other day, and though I'd never seen it before, I was able to tell what it meant immediately, even outside of any context. That's a lot more than you can say for the English word 'meglomania.'

That's interesting. It's a fascinating process.
I've no doubt you did but I really wonder how much context helps. In a similar manner to how context helps with unfamiliar words in English. I doubt I'd make the jump from "boast-large-delusion-complex" to megalomania without being primed somehow. (Indeed I'm not 100% sure that boasting is the best fit with megalomania) However having seen the link it would be (will be?) far easier to remember it in the future. I can see the logic of the link only in hindsight. Could you make the further jump when faced with 誇大妄想になる : get paranoid ? as paranoia and megalomania are different. But then languages must be full of phrases that don't quite make literal sense and need cultural knowledge or some extra knowledge to decode them. "raining cats and dogs" for instance.
And if you don't have the reading/pronunciation can you really equate it to full reading if you can't unlock the sounds? But then does it matter? Does the usage of some english concept to sit on top of a word in an otherwise Japanese sentence hinder you or break your rhythm? (Of course having to find a dictionary would be even more of a hindrance) When do you get to put sounds to the word?

The original question
It seems to me that they are so different and there are so many variables that a comparison of reading speeds doesn't really seem possible.
The nearest comparison I've seen was at a Japanese production of a Shakespearean play where I felt the Japanese dialog was rushed somehow to fit the time available or in comparison to the English text and delivery. But I'd say that was more an issue of translation (I'm not sure but I think no poetry was retained). Maybe the same ideas can take longer to express in Japanese. And yet they can also be masters of simplicity and understatement in forms like the Haiku. Maybe you just have to see the inherent strengths and beauty of each language and not get hung up on something as mundane as reading speed.

[QuackingShoe]

That's interesting. It's a fascinating process.
I've no doubt you did but I really wonder how much context helps. In a similar manner to how context helps with unfamiliar words in English. I doubt I'd make the jump from "boast-large-delusion-complex" to megalomania without being primed somehow. (Indeed I'm not 100% sure that boasting is the best fit with megalomania) However having seen the link it would be (will be?) far easier to remember it in the future. I can see the logic of the link only in hindsight. Could you make the further jump when faced with 誇大妄想になる : get paranoid ? as paranoia and megalomania are different. But then languages must be full of phrases that don't quite make literal sense and need cultural knowledge or some extra knowledge to decode them. "raining cats and dogs" for instance.
And if you don't have the reading/pronunciation can you really equate it to full reading if you can't unlock the sounds? But then does it matter? Does the usage of some english concept to sit on top of a word in an otherwise Japanese sentence hinder you or break your rhythm? (Of course having to find a dictionary would be even more of a hindrance) When do you get to put sounds to the word?

Is all of this directed at me? I'm not sure if you're asking me questions or pondering out loud. I'll answer anyway.

For 誇大妄想, I understood it completely out of context. The word was just sitting there by itself. I had an advantage in that I already knew the word 妄想, however. The initial thought that ran through my head was something along the lines of 'delusions of grandeur,' which is the same idea. And there are many examples of this kind of thing. Particularly when it comes to scientific terminology, things like 眼科 and 産科, the meaning just slaps you in the face in ways you only wish 'ophthalmology' and 'obstetrics' would. The more everyday Japanese words actually end up being more difficult to infer from kanji than the scientific or otherwise formal ones, in an interesting reversal from English.
Context does play a big role in general though. Being able to use context in combination with your knowledge of kanji can make the definition of a great variety of words obvious as you encounter them (this happens increasing often as time goes on).

A good point you mentioned and one of the other advantages I was alluding to (because recognition of new words I only meant as a single advantage of many) is the ease in remembering it in the future. Because of the nature of this particular word, I fully expect to be able to remember it indefinitely without any requirement for review, in the same way as words like 一酸化炭素 (and the individual parts thereof), because they just 'make sense'.
As for the pronunciation, it's really on a case-by-case basis. Experience lets you guess the readings in a word pretty accurately. 誇大妄想 happens to be a really easy one. Now, I couldn't have guessed the 誇 because I actually hadn't encountered this character's onyomi before, but, as it happens, it only has one. So everything fits together in a pretty simple way; I wouldn't have guessed the rest of the word as anything other than だいもうそう, (たい and whatever else just wouldn't have 'clicked' the same), which is what it is. In those instances where you can't infer the pronunciation, you still understand the word, which is a huge benefit when you simply need to get through something (and you can look the word up later). In addition, if you're reading some with furigana, this means not having to look anything up at all; the reading is right there, and you've guessed the meaning. When this is not the case, you can guess at the pronunciation, and you may be wrong, but with experience it's actually less of a hazard than with certain other languages (English). I want to clarify here that this isn't me Japanese-loving; English has it's own advantages. I'm in the whole 'all languages are equal, but different' camp.

Anyway, English concepts don't hover over words in a Japanese sentence for me. I don't actually go and think of 誇大妄想 as boast + large + delusion + complex(complex? Isn't the keyword something else? I don't even remember) ever. I think of it as　誇 + 大 + 妄 + 想. Or actually, in this case, I thought of it as 誇 + 大 + 妄想, because I was already aware of 妄想 as a word. And that's generally the case. I'm more inclined to try and remember other words I know that use a character than to try and dig out some keyword, but often enough even that isn't necessary because each kanji just gets a 'feel' to it that you don't need to put into any concrete thoughts.


I'd kindof like to reply to the original topic, but I just don't have anything meaningful to add. I imagine they're about the same. One thing's for sure; my Japanese reading is definitely quite a bit slower


Oh, lastly. What was your example with 誇大妄想になる about? It can refer to paranoia? I tried poking around but didn't see anything about that, aside from that fact that some degree of megalomania is considered characteristic of paranoid personality disorder. Fill me in?

[Taurus]

The nearest comparison I've seen was at a Japanese production of a Shakespearean play where I felt the Japanese dialog was rushed somehow to fit the time available or in comparison to the English text and delivery. But I'd say that was more an issue of translation (I'm not sure but I think no poetry was retained). Maybe the same ideas can take longer to express in Japanese.

Yeah, this doesn't seem, to me, to be related to reading speed, but it is a well-known fact among interpreters that different languages take different amounts of time to express ideas. I remember when I worked in banking we had to hire interpreters for meetings sometimes and they would explain that certain languages like, say, German, generally take x% longer than English, for example (I can't remember the precise percentage they gave).

[QuackingShoe]

Yeah, this doesn't seem, to me, to be related to reading speed, but it is a well-known fact among interpreters that different languages take different amounts of time to express ideas. I remember when I worked in banking we had to hire interpreters for meetings sometimes and they would explain that certain languages like, say, German, generally take x% longer than English, for example (I can't remember the precise percentage they gave).

Man, this is one of the main reasons (after horrible voice casting in general) that I wouldn't watch English dubs even before I could understand Japanese. People trying to cram ten English words into the space occupied by two Japanese words (and the reverse) is absolutely horrible to listen to.

[Javizy]

For instance, I encountered the word 誇大妄想 the other day, and though I'd never seen it before, I was able to tell what it meant immediately, even outside of any context. That's a lot more than you can say for the English word 'meglomania.'

That's pretty funny. The phrase 'delusions of grandeur' came to my mind, and I just typed it into eijirou and 誇大妄想　was the first result. I had to look through each character, though, so compared to familiar words, like 意気投合, which almost jump off the page as a single unit, and require no real thought process to understand, it's not an immediate process, for me at least.

Edit: I kind of skipped half the posts there. You can see plenty of examples, including 誇大妄想になる, on alc, which uses eijiro.

[QuackingShoe]

That's pretty funny. The phrase 'delusions of grandeur' came to my mind, and I just typed it into eijirou and 誇大妄想　was the first result. I had to look through each character, though, so compared to familiar words, like 意気投合, which almost jump off the page as a single unit, and require no real thought process to understand, it's not an immediate process, for me at least.

Edit: I kind of skipped half the posts there. You can see plenty of examples, including 誇大妄想になる, on alc, which uses eijiro.

Interesting! I'm getting the impression (through other reading as well) that the two ideas (megalomania and paranoia) have stronger links in the Japanese consciousness than they do in the English consciousness, or at least in mine.

[Psy]

As far as I'm concerned, the moment an English definition gets confusing, one should ditch it. Courtesy goo.co.jp, translation mine:

誇大妄想：
自分の地位・能力などを実際より過大に評価して、自分が他人より優れていると確信すること。
The belief that one surpasses others by judging one's own social status/abilities, etc. to be well beyond what they are in reality.

妄想：
根拠のない誤った判断に基づいて作られた主観的な信念。
Subjective convictions rooted upon baseless, false judgements.

There really is a lot of overlap if you think about it, especially if you consider that 誇大 is "exaggeration."

Back on topic, as for reading speed, I have the (albeit without much backing) belief that people are people, regardless of language, and that reading speed is thus limited by the rate at which an individual can comprehend ideas and his exposure to a given writing system. I'd propose that, given two people with equal intellects and backgrounds (but in different languages), the rate at which they could absorb ideas an concepts would be roughly the same. In short, a human limitation, not a cultural one.

I reserve the right to be completely wrong about this one.

[sanufi]

Interesting thoughts. I am myself only a beginner in Japanese so most of what was said is probably beyond me at this point. But I think I can sort of understand how, to some people, kanji words can form a cohesive whole in your mind faster than say English words. Maybe it's due to the way kanji characters were formed from pictorial representations and hence form a 'picture' in your mind faster. Also, the way kanji characters are reused in different combinations with one another to form different words.

Are scientific and other higher learning concepts expressed in Japanese using kanji or katakana? Does it get complicated trying to read and understand the kanji combinations or the katakana here?

Katakana reading for me is still slow going. Do any fluent readers manage to read katakana words as fast as English words?

[Belton]

[
Is all of this directed at me? I'm not sure if you're asking me questions or pondering out loud. I'll answer anyway.

Oh, sorry. Yes and no I suppose. Mostly I'm wondering aloud but I'm also interested in the process you go through when reading Japanese. I'm not criticising or judging your experience.

The paranoia example I threw in because It popped up in waeiji. I thought it was interesting that the word also linked to paranoia and again I wouldn't make the jump from megalomania to paranoia.

Indeed maybe if you're reading about that level of idea you are much better off using a Japanese dictionary rather than a bi-lingual dictionary as Psyさん suggests.
Of course there is never really exact one to one translations especially when you start into more complex ideas. Otherwise machine translation would be better than it is.

"concept" is the Heisig keyword for 想, my mistake. I wonder how I came up with complex?

subs and translation.
Ninagawa is famous for his stagings of Shakespeare. Obviously the English text is the definitive version so that is used in the surtitles. The Japanese used by the actors just seemed much longer. I wondered why they just didn't take the basic plot and do their own version of it.
Good subtitling is a bit of an art. A friend of mine who does it was explaining to me the limitations on how many characters can be used per title. It's not just about making a translation.
(By the way, Ninagawa's stagings are well worth seeing. He is in London again next month doing "Twelfth Night" as a kabuki which should be interesting. )


katakana
I may never understand why Japanese use this when they want clarity.
For me compared to hiragana the letterforms don't have sufficient difference for reading quickly. As well as the general blockiness. Oddly even with my limited knowledge kanji are easier.

It's an unfamiliar language in an unfamiliar writing system. I am S---L---O---W.
But I'm faster than I once was. I can skim over stuff that I expect to be there, phrases and verb endings etc, rather than read character by character. I can see the pattern in an unfamiliar word in kanji or katakana then can infer and keep on going or look it up and apply it to the rest of the passage. In a similar fashion to Quackくん, I can leverage my knowledge of known kanji to cope with new words. (Although I'd guess his knowledge of kanji meanings is much greater than mine)