An average score is actually 1.478 throughout the plosive standing, 1.forty-five throughout the fricative condition, step one.707 on nasal standing, and step one.942 from the drinking water status. A reduced section when you look at the Table 3 summarises the results out of modelling regarding Set step three. The brand new standard is the newest fricative updates, so we compared new plosive versus. fricative requirements, brand new nasal compared to. fricative criteria, in addition to h2o against. fricative requirements. Earliest, the difference between the plosive and you can fricative standards was not credible, once the 95% CI of the coefficient estimate incorporated zero [?0.06, 0.09]. 2nd, brand new nasal compared to. fricative and you can liquids vs. fricative contrasting revealed that each of the fresh new coefficient estimates was positive (? = 0.16) (nasal) and (? = 0.3) (liquid) and you can each of brand new 95% CIs don’t include no ([0.09, 0.24] (nasal) and you may [0.23, 0.38] (liquid)), and therefore indicating one nonce terms having nasals and you will water had been judged getting a lot more kawaii brands as opposed to those that have fricatives.
The modern data revealed that (1) labial consonants are more inclined to be from the kawaii than coronal and you may dorsal consonants, (2) high-regularity consonants will end up being with the kawaii than just low-regularity consonants, and you can (3) drinking water /?/ and you may nasal /n/ are more inclined to getting associated with kawaii than fricative /z/ (and you can plosive /d/). Such efficiency advise that the spot-of-articulation function of the kawaii is actually [labial], together with volume ability regarding the kawaii is actually [high-frequency]. The manner-of-articulation feature requires next discussion. Since the consonant appearing the highest average rating was drinking water /?/, we can think that trends-of-articulation ability associated with the kawaii is [liquid]. Yet not, given that Bayesian studies demonstrated, nasal /n/ is far more probably be associated with kawaii than just fricative /z/. For this reason, we are able to conclude one to h2o and nasals, each of which happen to be [sonorant], is actually with the kawaii.
This study showed that the features of consonants associated with kawaii in Japanese are [labial], [high frequency], and [sonorant]. The motivations for the three features are briefly discussed below. The feature [labial] may be linked to a pouting gesture, that is, a gesture made using both lips can induce Japanese people to feel kawaii (Kumagai, 2020). The feature [labial] may also be linked to the image of babies, in that bilabial consonants are more frequent in the earlier phases of language acquisition (Kumagai and Kawahara, 2020). Thus, it can be said that consonants with feature [labial] can evoke the image of babies, at least in Japanese. The feature [high frequency] may stem from briefness, as the frequency code hypothesis states that high-frequency sounds are associated with smallness (Ohala, 1984, 1994). The feature [sonorant] may be connected to a number of observations on sound symbolic effects in names and shapes. Sonorants are better suited for female names or rounded shapes (Shinohara and Kawahara, 2013; Asano et al., 2015). To summarise, the factors associated with kawaii may include pouting gesture, babyishness, smallness, femininity, and roundness. It is interesting that some of these factors overlap with the factors noted by Kinsella (1995) for cute characters. She noted that ‘The essential anatomy of a cute cartoon character consists in its being small, soft, infantile, mammalian, round, without bodily appendages (e.g., arms), without bodily kissbrides.com vГҐr webbplats orifices (e.g., mouths), non-sexual, mute, insecure, helpless or bewildered’. (p. 226; emphasis mine). Taking the fact into consideration that Kinsella (1995) was published more than 25 years ago, it is inferred that something that evokes kawaii in the minds of Japanese speakers has not changed for at least 25 years.
As noted in the introduction section, it is well known that sound symbolism plays an important role in ; Klink and Wu, 2014). The exploration of what consonants are better suited for kawaii names is an interesting topic. Based on the above discussion, it is inferred that the consonants that induce the feeling of kawaii among Japanese people include /p/, /?/, and /m/, as the first consonant /p/ is specified with [labial] and [high frequency], the second consonant /?/ with [sonorant], and the third consonant /m/ with [labial] and [sonorant]. Based on his kawaii judgment experiment with Japanese speakers, Kumagai (2019) discusses whether /m/, in addition to /p/, is another consonant expressive of kawaii in Japanese, since his study results demonstrated that fewest differences existed regarding average scores between nonce words with /p/ and those with /m/. In Japanese words or character names that seem to be associated with kawaii, we find examples that contain /p/, /?/, or /m/. For example, a mimetic word, or onomatopoeia, purupuru, is used to express something soft or something that trembles like jelly. We also find a cute character name pomupomu purin ‘Pom Pom Purin’, created by Sanrio. Moreover, Kawahara (2019) reported that bilabial consonants and /?/ are often used in girls’ names in a popular Japanese anime PreCure, broadcast since 2004. It is expected that these consonants will prove applicable in naming anime characters or products that are characterised by kawaii.
