The present study aimed to examine to what extent an English word ignored is processed. The subjects were required to name the category of a target word, ignoring a distracting word. Although the English and Japanese words used in the present study were similar in sound, they were different in script. The results showed that inhibition was produced in categorizing a Japanese target word even when an English word was used as a distracting word. This inhibition was not produced in the previous similar study using ordinary words (Ikeda, 1993). The results of the present study suggested an English word ignored is automatically phonetically processed.

Key words: English words, Japanese words, lexical representation, conceptual representation, Japanese university students