Grammatical Differences between Japanese Sign Language, Pidgin Sign Japanese, and Manually Coded Japanese : Effects on Comprehension

Abstract

The purpose of the present study was to examine the effects of grammatical differences among Japanese Sign Language (JSL), Pidgin Sign Japanese (PSJ), and Manually Coded Japanese (MCJ), on the comprehension of sign language by 35 high school students who are deaf. Each participant was given 3 types of comprehension tasks : Japanese Sign Language, Pidgin Sign Japanese, and Manually Coded Japanese. Based on their proficiency in Sign Language and Japanese (high or low in each), participants were divided into 4 groups. The results were as follows : The average scores of the group with high proficiency in both Sign Language and Japanese were higher on both Japanese Sign Language and Manually Coded Japanese. The group highly proficient in Sign Language but with low proficiency in Japanese had higher scores on Japanese Sign Language. The group with low proficiency in Sign Language but high proficiency in Japanese had higher scores on Manually Coded Japanese. The group with poor proficiency in both Sign Language and Japanese had lower scores on all 3 types of comprehension tasks.