拡張新字体の認識について

Abstract

This thesis is concerned with the extended new character form (拡張新字体) in Japanese. The study of character form (字体) is not so common and as for the extended new character form, the studies are even more limited. The purpose of the present thesis is to investigate and analyze the recognition of the extended new character form by Japanese university students. About fifty Japanese university students were asked to answer a questionnaire consisting of three parts: in the first part, the students were asked to write an appropriate character while in the second and third parts, they were asked to select the appropriate characters where both the extended new character form and the standard character form were presented. The results of the selection tasks indicate that there is a weak tendency that the choice is related to the frequency of usage of the character in question. However, because of the diversity found among the characters, it cannot be concluded that the frequency of the usage is solely responsible in the recognition of character form. An error analysis of the writing task indicates, however, both structural similarity and relevance in meaning are involved in the recognition as well. Thus the recognition of the character form is thought to be affected both by the frequency of its usage, structural similarity, and similarity in meaning. Though limited in the scope and size of investigation, the present study has shown some areas to which future studies can be directed.