THE TWO FOLD PURPOSE OF THIS STUDY WAS TO (1) INVESTIGATE THE RELATIVE EFFECTIVENESS OF GRAPHEMIC AND PERCEPTUAL REPRESENTATIONS IN TEACHING CONCEPTS OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE WORDS, AND (2) DETERMINE WHAT HAPPENS UPON PRESENTING SUCH REPRESENTATIONS IN THE CONTEXT OF OTHERS. FOR THE PURPOSES OF THIS STUDY, A PERCEPTUAL REPRESENTATION WAS DEFINED AS "A COLOR OR A LINE-DRAWING" OF AN OBJECT, AND A GRAPHEMIC REPRESENTATION AS AN "ENGLISH NAME FOR A COLOR, GEOMETRIC FIGURE, OR AN OBJECT." STUDY PARTICIPANTS WERE 136 SIXTH-GRADE PUBLIC SCHOOL CHILDREN. USING VARIOUS TREATMENTS, THESE CHILDREN WERE TRAINED FOR LISTENING COMPREHENSION OF 12 JAPANESE NAMES FOR COLORS AND OBJECTS, AND THEN TESTED FOR UNDERSTANDING OF THESE JAPANESE WORDS IMMEDIATELY AFTER TRAINING AND 1 WEEK LATER. READING COMPREHENSION WAS ALSO TESTED (ABILITY TO READ THE JAPANESE WORDS IN ROMANIZED SPELLING). FINDINGS INDICATED THAT PERCEPTUAL REPRESENTATION TRAINING RESULTED IN BETTER LISTENING AND READING COMPREHENSION THAN GRAPHEMIC TRAINING. TRAINING WITH OR WITHOUT DISCRIMINATIVE CONTEXT DID NOT RESULT IN SIGNIFICANT DIFFERENCES IN COMPREHENSION. (JH)