Question about に and には in terms of emphasis

Question

I read the post on here from 2011 about the difference between に and には, but I came back still a little confused (especially with all the non-layman grammar words like transitive/nominative/etc).

I have two examples and I think I know how to use には, but I'm wondering if someone could double-check or expand on the subject.

日本語はアメリカ人には難しいと思います。

I think Japanese is (more) difficult for Americans (as opposed to other nationalities).

So, in a way, I'm implying that I'm taking into consideration other nationalities compared to Americans in terms of English being difficult, putting emphasis that it is much harder for Americans compared to others.

日本語はアメリカ人に難しいと思います。

I think Japanese is difficult for Americans.

This would be just saying that Japanese is hard for Americans, not comparing it to any other country/nationality. So its implied I could also think Japanese is equally as hard for, say, Russian people and that Americans don't necessarily have a harder time.

What do you all think? Would love some feedback to properly understand には better.

Answer 1

Hope this does not shock you too badly. If anything, it is at least an honest opinion of a native speaker.

Regardless of one's intended meaning and/or nuance, it sounds much more natural to say:

1.「日本語はアメリカ人には難しいと思います。」

than to say:

2.「日本語はアメリカ人に難しいと思います。 」

To be even more honest, my ears do not accept Sentence #2. Sure, I could easily guess what the speaker/author would have wanted to say but I also know without even thinking that Sentence #2 is not something many native speakers would say in a natural setting. We would use 「には」.

Besides 「には」, one could use 「にとっては」, but not just 「に」.

Moving on to the topic of "Americans vs. Others"...

Sentence #1, all by itself without further context, does not mean or imply that people from other countries have an easier time learning Japanese than Americans do. To mean that, it would need to be mentioned in the surrounding sentences.

The easiest way to express that without even creating a whole new sentence would be to say:

「日本語はアメリカ人には特に難しいと思います。」 or

「日本語はアメリカ人にとっては特に難しいと思います。」

「[特]{とく}に」 can be placed right in front of 「アメリカ人」 in either sentence.

Extra:

As an おまけ, here is an example of the "emphatic 「には」 vs. plain 「に」".

「スカイツリーは東京にあります。大阪にはありません。」

I do know that many J-learners would just use 「に」 in the second sentence, too.