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SOUNDS FULL OF MEANING across languages. Several consistent associations between sounds and specific meanings were found. One example is an association between the vowel /i/ and the concept of “small,” such as French “petite,” or Maori “iti.” In the fol- lowing, we discuss possible reasons for further research on the sound-to-size mapping. Another example is the correlation of /m/ and /u/ with the concept of “breast.” Both sounds engage the lips during articulation. For /u/, the lips are protruded and for /m/ they are closed. This use of lips has been discussed in terms of a direct rela- tionship to sucking and breastfeeding in babies, therefore aligning with the meaning of breast. We later go into more detail and explore the evidence for sounds to create and, ultimately, bear meaning. Cross-Modal Correspondence Sounds can become meaningful when they are fused with other sensory information such as visual shape or touch. The product of this “fusion” is called a cross-modal cor- respondence. Everyday human life is full of cross-modal experiences. We perceive the world around us through all senses: smell, taste, touch, sight, and sound. Remem- ber the example from the beginning, your favorite cake coming out of the oven. You may recollect the good smell in the air, the delicious taste, the texture in the mouth, and the mmm-sound. For sure, this cake looks good waiting for you on the table! Sound symbolism is only one specific case of cross- modal correspondence. It is probably more common than we realize. For example, all diaper brand names in Japan and most in Germany include a bilabial con- sonant, a consonant that is produced using both lips, because we connect bilabial sounds with babies, who use their lips to suck milk and make the first sounds. A whole branch of marketing research deals with design- ing a perfect brand or product name according to what the product is, how it is used, and the target group. So, in supermarkets, our attention may be caught by a prod- uct name that is imposed on specific properties of the product and designed for a specific target group. The vowel /a/ can be correlated with dark beer rather than light beer, and women generally respond more favor- ably to products containing front vowels like /e/ or /i/ (Klink, 2000; 2009). Examples of sound symbolism can also be found in fantasy names, such as Pokémon. And so, the strength or size of the Pokémon can be correlated with such things as the name length or the number of certain consonants. Here again, one sensory modality, such as the visual perception of size, might be reflected in the sound of its name. We now introduce a few examples of the fascinating world of cross-modal correspondences (for a review, see Spence, 2011). We picked some of the very popular ones and some that may be relatively less known. We do not wish to imply that every human will perceive these cross-modal corre- spondences in the same way. It must be borne in mind that sound-meaning relationships can also be specific for a particular language. However, here, we specifically rely on examples, which have been tested cross-linguistically. A large proportion of speakers across the globe would match selected sounds with other sensory properties. One reason for choosing these examples is that the role of sound sym- bolism in language evolution is discussed in Cross-Modal Correspondence and Language Evolution. Sounds Map to Visual Shapes One of the most popular cross-modal correspondences is the “bouba”/“kiki” effect, originally known as “baluba”/“takete” (Köhler, 1947). It has been repeatedly shown that when people are asked to match the pseudowords bouba and kiki toavisualshape,mostofthemwilluseboubafortheround shape and kiki for the spiky shape (Figure 1). When asked to draw the fantasy characters called bouba or kiki, the artist may end up with characters as shown in Figure 2. Those also exhibit rounder shapes for the Figure 1. The visual shapes representing a round shape correlated with bouba and an angular shape correlated with kiki. Adapted from Ćwiek et al. (2022), under CC BY 4.0 license. 44 Acoustics Today • Summer 2022