The relationship between monosyllables and pure tones: An investigation of phonetic symbolism

Tarte, Robert D.

doi:10.1016/s0022-5371(82)90670-3

Cited by 30 publications

(52 citation statements)

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“…Females and males might then be drawn to gender stereotypical vowel space, leading to gender moderated vowel changes. 13 Although the authors do not mention it, there is some evidence of a sound symbolic association between high-front vowels (low-back vowels) and femininity (masculinity; Greenberg & Jenkins, 1966;Tarte, 1982;Wu, Klink, & Guo, 2013;cf. Sidhu & Pexman, 2015).…”

Section: Mechanisms For Associations Between Phonetic and Semantic Fementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Much of Walker's work focuses a core set of connotations including: light/heavy, sharp/blunt, quick/slow, bright/dark, and small/large (e.g., P. Walker & Walker, 2012). Others have focused on connotations that comprise the three factors of connotative meaning discovered by Osgood, Suci, and Tannenbaum (1957), namely, evaluation (e.g., good/bad), potency (e.g., strong/ weak), and activity (e.g., active/passive; e.g., Miron, 1961;Tarte, 1982).…”

Section: Mechanisms For Associations Between Phonetic and Semantic Fementioning

confidence: 99%

“…20 Indeed there is evidence of both playing a role. For instance, Tarte's (1982) research comparing vowels to pure tones showed that vowels are associated with some stimuli in a way that would be expected if pairings were based on vowels' component frequencies. Eberhardt's (1940) discovery of sound symbolism in profoundly deaf individuals suggested that articulatory features in isolation can contribute to sound symbolism (though admittedly in a specific population; cf.…”

Section: Outstanding Issues and Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Five mechanisms of sound symbolic association

2017

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Sound symbolism refers to an association between phonemes and stimuli containing particular perceptual and/or semantic elements (e.g., objects of a certain size or shape). Some of the best-known examples include the mil/mal effect (Sapir, Journal of Experimental Psychology, 12, 225-239, 1929) and the maluma/takete effect (Köhler, 1929). Interest in this topic has been on the rise within psychology, and studies have demonstrated that sound symbolic effects are relevant for many facets of cognition, including language, action, memory, and categorization. Sound symbolism also provides a mechanism by which words' forms can have nonarbitrary, iconic relationships with their meanings. Although various proposals have been put forth for how phonetic features (both acoustic and articulatory) come to be associated with stimuli, there is as yet no generally agreed-upon explanation. We review five proposals: statistical co-occurrence between phonetic features and associated stimuli in the environment, a shared property among phonetic features and stimuli; neural factors; species-general, evolved associations; and patterns extracted from language. We identify a number of outstanding questions that need to be addressed on this topic and suggest next steps for the field.

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Section: Mechanisms For Associations Between Phonetic and Semantic Fementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Mechanisms For Associations Between Phonetic and Semantic Fementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Outstanding Issues and Future Directionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Five mechanisms of sound symbolic association

2017

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“…Other evidence, in various forms, confirms the same cross-sensory associations involving auditory pitch in people who are not regarded as being synaesthetes (i.e., the general population). For example, when typical English speaking adults draw music they are listening to, they draw lines and forms that are more angular (sharper), brighter, higher on the page, Running head: CROSS-SENSORY CORRESPONDENCES 6 smaller, and thinner, the higher in pitch and/or faster in tempo is the music (Karwoski, Odbert, & Osgood, 1942; Kussner & Leech-Wilkinson, 2013 (Boltz, 2011;Collier & Hubbard, 2001Eitan & Timmers, 2010; Marks, 1974 Marks, , 1975 Marks, , 1978Perrott, Musicant, & Schwethelm, 1980;Tarte, 1982;L. Walker, P. Walker, & Francis, 2012;P.…”

Section: The Cross-sensory Features Of Soundsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Walker & Smith, 1985;. For the three core dimensions of height (auditory pitch), brightness, and size, therefore, there is evidence confirming the Running head: CROSS-SENSORY CORRESPONDENCES 21 coherent transitivity of the associations among them (as illustrated in Figure 5A), and for the amodal and conceptual nature of the representations being linked.There is also evidence, albeit less extensive, confirming the transitivity of the cross-sensory correspondences among other sets of three feature dimensions.Specifically, equivalent evidence emerges when auditory pitch and visual surface brightness together are considered in conjunction with other feature dimensions, including pointiness (Marks, 1987;Parise & Spence, 2009;Tarte, 1982;P. Walker, 2012a;P.…”

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confidence: 99%

Cross-sensory correspondences: A theoretical framework and their relevance to music.

Walker

2016

Psychomusicology: Music, Mind, and Brain

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Each of our senses is 'blind' to some features of objects and events (e.g., hearing can tell us little or nothing about the shape, colour, and weight of an object, or about how it might taste or smell). When we listen to sounds without support from other sensory modalities, such as when listening to recorded music, how do will fill-in these blind spots? Evidence identifying a core set of cross-sensory correspondences among basic stimulus features is reviewed, and it is proposed that they offer a potential basis for the filling-in of information that is missing when one or more sensory systems is not available. An emerging theoretical framework for understanding correspondences and their impact on behaviour is presented. Evidence pertaining to key features of the framework is reviewed, including that cross-sensory correspondences are based on crosstalk among conceptual representations of aligned feature dimensions, are bi-directional in their effects, obey transitivity in the feature associations they support, involve the relative (context-sensitive) coding of stimulus features, and can be accessed through the verbal specification of feature values. After illustrating how cross-sensory correspondences are able to embrace basic features of bodily actions, gestures, and vocalisations, their potential for exploitation in the communication of ideas is explained. The relevance of cross-sensory correspondences to musical sounds, and their potential to enhance the composition, performance, and appreciation of music, are discussed. Running head: CROSS-SENSORY CORRESPONDENCES 3Cross-Sensory Correspondences: A Theoretical Framework and Their Relevance to MusicIn our everyday interactions with the environment we gather information about objects and events simultaneously through different sensory modalities, with the acquisition of information about some features of objects and events being duplicated across modalities. For example, vision and touch can both discern the size and shape of a tangible object, though touch normally requires the object to be within reach. In such cases of duplication it need not be a problem if, for some reason, one of the modalities cannot be used, because the same information can be gathered using a modality that is available (e.g., when vision confirms the size and shape of a tangible object that is out of reach).Information about some features, however, is available only through a single modality. A novel object's brightness and colour, for example, can be identified only through vision, the pitch of the sound it is making only through audition, and its weight only through dynamic touch. In such cases problems do arise when the modality best placed to provide information about a particular feature is not available, and there is considerable interest in how the 'blind spots' this creates are filled-in. How is it that in everyday life we readily refer to, for example, the brightness of a sound that cannot be seen, the loudness of a shirt that cannot be heard, and the thickness and heavi...

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Newborns are sensitive to the correspondence between auditory pitch and visuospatial elevation

Walker

Bremner

Lunghi

et al. 2018

Developmental Psychobiology

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Amodal (redundant) and arbitrary cross-sensory feature associations involve the context-insensitive mapping of absolute feature values across sensory domains. Cross-sensory associations of a different kind, known as correspondences, involve the context-sensitive mapping of relative feature values. Are such correspondences in place at birth (like amodal associations), or are they learned from subsequently experiencing relevant feature co-occurrences in the world (like arbitrary associations)? To decide between these two possibilities, human newborns (median age = 44 hr) watched animations in which two balls alternately rose and fell together in space. The pitch of an accompanying sound rose and fell either congruently with this visual change (pitch rising and falling as the balls moved up and down), or incongruently (pitch rising and falling as the balls moved down and up). Newborns' looking behavior was sensitive to this congruence, providing the strongest indication to date that cross-sensory correspondences can be in place at birth.

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The relationship between monosyllables and pure tones: An investigation of phonetic symbolism

Cited by 30 publications

References 17 publications

Five mechanisms of sound symbolic association

Five mechanisms of sound symbolic association

Cross-sensory correspondences: A theoretical framework and their relevance to music.

Newborns are sensitive to the correspondence between auditory pitch and visuospatial elevation

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