Which is "Bouba", and which is "Kiki"? [video]

Fun fact for the fans of the “Baba Is You” game[1]:

> the naming of the characters Baba and Keke was inspired by the bouba/kiki effect.

Which makes a lot of sense for a game where meaning itself is one of the core gameplay elements. If you didn’t play that title yet and you enjoy puzzle games, try it.

[1]: Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baba_Is_You

Here is the Wikipedia article about the phenomenon of the bouba–kiki effect if you prefer text form or want to know more about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bouba%2Fkiki_effect

One of my favourite nerdy jokes is that the Fourier transform is a bouba-kiki transform.

Recently came across another video that demonstrates the effect

https://www.instagram.com/p/DP7CXKACDOY/

This phenomenon of "sound symbolism" has received a lot of research attention in the last 10 years or so. For a long time it was considered a curiosity at best, and a total red herring at worst, but a lot of evidence is accumulating that sound symbolic effects are very real and may have profound implications for our understanding of sensorimotor cognition.

The shapes just look like the letters. K’s have sharp corners, B’s are round.