The Bouba/Kiki Effect: Regardless of What Language They Speak, People Around the World Agree that "Bouba" Sounds Round in Shape whereas "Kiki" Sounds Pointy

The ‘bouba/kiki effect’ states that the made-up word “bouba” makes a sound resembling that of a round shape and the made-up word “kiki” makes a sound resembling that of a pointy shape. This effect is not exclusive to the English language, but it is actually applicable to most languages around the world. This is true even for those with different writing systems, according to language scientists.

An international research team observed this effect after conducting a wide cross-cultural test around the world. The ‘bouba/kiki effect’ test included 917 speakers of 25 different languages with nine language families and ten writing systems. The findings of the research team are now published in Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B.

“Our ancestors could have used links between speech sounds and visual properties to create some of the first spoken words – and today, many thousands of years later, the perceived roundness of the English word ‘balloon’ may not be just a coincidence, after all,” said co-author Dr. Marcus Perlman, Lecturer in English Language and Linguistics at the University of Birmingham.

“New words that are perceived to resemble the object or concept they refer to are more likely to be understood and adopted by a wider community of speakers. Sound-symbolic mappings such as in bouba/kiki may play an important ongoing role in the development of spoken language vocabularies,” mentioned co-author Dr. Bodo Winter, Senior Lecturer in Cognitive Linguistics at the University of Birmingham.

The ‘bouba/kiki effect’ suggests that there are shared characteristics of languages around the world, such as iconic vocalizations that can be used as a global basis for the formation of new words. Moreover, the effect could also be a clue to the origins of spoken words.

Image: University of Birmingham

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