Consonant beginnings and vowel endings lead to higher liking judgments.

Abstract

Across languages, syllables more likely begin with consonants (vs. vowels) and end with vowels (vs. consonants), so that words that follow (vs. do not follow) this pattern are more familiar. In six experiments (total N = 638), we investigated the influence of beginning and ending letters (vowels vs. consonants) of pseudowords on preferences. Pseudowords that begin with consonants (vs. vowels) were preferred; independently, pseudowords that end with vowels (vs. consonants) were also preferred. Both of these consonant-vowel-preference effects generalized across stimulus sets and across speakers of German and English (Experiments 1a-1c). Additionally, consistent with familiarity as the underlying mechanism, pseudowords with consonant (vs. vowel) beginnings and vowel (vs. consonant) endings were more frequently judged to be real words (Experiment 2). The word-ending effect-but surprisingly, not the word-beginning effect-generalized to auditory stimulus presentation (Experiments 3a-3b). Thus, we find that preferences for vowel (vs. consonant) at word endings are more robust than preferences for consonant (vs. vowel) at word beginnings. By showing that consonant-vowel structure systematically influences preferences, we demonstrate two new associations between word form and affective meaning. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).