The sound of a word like “knife” or “truck” seems totally arbitrary–it’s just a random sound we’ve assigned to a thing, right? But for several decades, scientists have found good evidence that the ...

A field of linguistics, not without its skeptics, known as sound symbolism, posits that certain sounds have certain meanings, and that these sounds trigger imagery that is consistent and meaningful.

Smoother-sounding names like Liam or Noelle were judged as more agreeable and emotional, while spikier-sounding names like Tate or Krista were judged as more extroverted. OTTAWA: Imagine you're hiring ...

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Maria Zijlstra: I'm Maria Zijlstra joined this week by John Ohala, an emeritus professor of linguistics ...

In the ancient kingdom of Babbalot, people worshipped two gods, Bouba and Kiki, whose complementary forces maintained balance in the universe. Bouba and Kiki each had its own symbol, as shown in the ...

During the pandemic, many of us have felt our stress levels rise every time we hear the word “virus”. But few people realise that just the sound of the word virus alone is likely to raise the blood ...

In the ancient kingdom of Babbalot, people worshipped two gods, Bouba and Kiki, whose complementary forces maintained balance in the universe. Bouba and Kiki each had its own symbol, as shown in the ...

We’ve all experienced how certain sounds can grate on our nerves, such as the noise made by dragging your fingernails across a blackboard (Getty/iStock) During the pandemic, many of us have felt our ...