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Article History

Received: 15 September 2024

Accepted: 21 February 2025

First Online: 11 March 2025

Competing interests

: The authors declare no competing interests.

: This study was conducted in accordance with the principles of the Declaration of Helsinki. Ethical approval was granted by the Ethics Committee of the Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Hiroshima University, on March 9, 2023 (Approval No. HR-PSY-000868). The approval encompasses the implementation of behavioral experiments involving Chinese learners of Japanese and the statistical analysis of the data collected.

: Written informed consent was obtained from all participants between May and June 2023. Consent was collected by Xiaodong Fei, who provided participants with a detailed explanation of the study’s purpose, procedures, and their right to withdraw at any time without consequences. The consent form also included assurances of confidentiality and anonymity, and explained that the data would be used solely for research purposes. All participants were adults capable of providing consent, and no vulnerable populations were involved in this study.