JALT2025 - Tokyo

A Study of Intensifiers Used by Japanese English Language Learners

Nov 1, 2025, 12:10 PM

1h

National Olympics Memorial Youth Center / 国立オリンピック記念青少年総合センター

Poster Presentation (60-minutes) Sociocultural Linguistics and Pragmatics Room 416

Speaker

Timothy Wilson (Hiroshima Jogakuin University)

Description

Words can mean many different things depending on the sentence that they appear in, and this can be a problem for Japanese learners of English who often have trouble telling the different meanings apart, especially when the words are intensifiers. This study examines the use and variety of intensifiers that have been acquired by Japanese English language learners and finds out what intensifiers participants use in 10 different everyday scenarios and situations.

Summary

Words can mean many different things depending on the sentence that they appear in, and this can be a problem for Japanese learners of English who often have trouble telling the different meanings apart, especially when the words are intensifiers. This study examines the use and variety of intensifiers that have been acquired by Japanese English language learners and finds out what intensifiers participants use in 10 different everyday scenarios and situations..