The Relationship between Names and Face Images Imparted with Sound-shape Symbolism

Abstract

Sound symbolism is the non-arbitrary associations between pseudowords and meanings. It has been reported that these associations extend to the lexical stimulus (e.g., names and faces); however, it is not clear whether non-native English speakers feel the same way. Experimental results using the stimuli that have existing associations might be affected by language family. In this study, we created high-quality images of Caucasians with generative modeling and then conducted a questionnaire survey on Japanese native speakers. The results showed that names containing round-sounding phonemes could be associated with face images possessing feature amounts related to roundness. The same is true of sharpness. This tendency implies Japanese native speakers also feel the non-arbitrary associations between names and faces.