Language-Specific Sound-Shape Matching at 12-Months of Age

Abstract

ABSTRACT By 12 months of age, infants exhibit behavioral sensitivity to sound symbolism (e.g. sound-shape correspondences) when they hear universally sound symbolic pseudowords (e.g. “bouba,” “kiki”). Here, we investigated whether infant’s sensitivity to sound-shape correspondences is affected when they hear language-specific sound symbolic words. Using the spontaneous preference-looking paradigm, we tested 12-month-old monolingual Spanish (n = 13) and Basque (n = 16) infants matching Spanish-like pseudowords (i.e. “bubano,” “raceto”) with rounded and spiky shapes. These pseudowords were created by Spanish-Basque bilingual adults, who then rated pseudowords as more Spanish or Basque-like, and more rounded or spikey-like. Infants were presented with eight congruent (e.g. “bubano” presented with a rounded shape) and incongruent (e.g. “bubano” presented with a spiky shape) trials. Both Spanish and Basque-learning infants displayed similar increased sensitivity to incongruent than to congruent trials. We found weak evidence that language background modulates sound-shape correspondence. These results suggest that at 12 months of age, specific language experience (e.g. Spanish vs. Basque) most likely does not alter sound-shape bias when hearing Spanish-like sound combinations. This study was the first to utilize language-specific instead of language nonspecific stimuli. Nonetheless, similar to previous investigations, the sound-shape bias effect was exhibited at 12 months of age in both language groups.