Rhyme over Reason

Benczes, Réka

doi:10.1017/9781108649131

Cited by 19 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 209 publications

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“…Overwhelmingly, these studies have found significant memory and learning effects for rhyme; McGlone and Tofighbakhsh (1999, 2000) add to these findings that rhyme bolsters impressions of accuracy. Moreover, rhyme is pervasive in ordinary language (Benczes, 2019) from childhood terminology like itsy-bitsy to the organizational principles of scientific nomenclatures, such as identifying alcohol compounds ( ethanol , butanol … ). Benczes (2019) stresses the importance of “playful” and esthetic aspects of language more generally for processes of word formation, language acquisition, phatic communion, and notably, establishing credibility.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beauty and truth, truth and beauty: Chiastic structure increases the subjective accuracy of statements.

Kara-Yakoubian¹,

Walker²,

Sharpinskyi³

et al. 2022

Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology / Revue canadienne

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The Keats heuristic suggests that people find esthetically pleasing expressions more accurate than mundane expressions. We test this notion with chiastic statements. Chiasmus is a stylistic phenomenon in which at least two linguistic constituents are repeated in reverse order, conventionally represented by the formula A-B-B-A. Our study focuses on the specific form of chiasmus known as antimetabole, in which the reverse-repeated constituents are words (e.g., All for one and one for all; A = all, B = one). In three out of four experiments (N = 797), we find evidence that people judge antimetabolic statements (e.g., Success is getting what you want. Happiness is wanting what you get.) as more accurate than semantically equivalent nonantimetabolic statements (e.g., Success is getting what you wish. Happiness is wanting what you receive.). Furthermore, we evaluate fluency as a potential mechanism explaining the observed accuracy benefit afforded to antimetabolic statements, finding that the increased speed (i.e., fluency) with which antimetabolic statements were processed predicted judgments of accuracy. Overall, the present work is consistent with the growing literature on stylistic factors biasing assessments of truth, using the distinctive stylistic pattern of antimetabole. We find that information communicated using an antimetabolic structure is judged to be more accurate than nonantimetabolic paraphrases. Public Significance StatementThe rhetorical figure called antimetabole repeats words in the reverse order (e.g., nice and important in It's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice). We found that antimetabolic statements evoke stronger feelings of truthfulness compared to the same meanings expressed without reverse repetition (e.g., It's nice to be important, but it's more critical to be kind). We argue that the increased speed with which antimetabolic statements are judged partially explains the accuracy benefit that they confer. Our findings suggest that stylistic factors-in this case, antimetabole-bias evaluations of truth.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Beauty and truth, truth and beauty: Chiastic structure increases the subjective accuracy of statements.

Kara-Yakoubian¹,

Walker²,

Sharpinskyi³

et al. 2022

Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology / Revue canadienne

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show abstract

“…Joseph presaged a trend of interest in ‘marginal’ linguistic phenomena, and his paper has been cited in over a dozen articles on topics such as ideophones, sound symbolism and phonesthesia 7 . In her monograph Rhyme over Reason , Réka Benczes (2019: 18) takes note of the ‘growing body of research into atypical patterns in English word-formation’, and contributes by exploring words formed through phonological motivation. This includes phonesthematic (‘sound-symbolic’) words such as ‘ glimmer and glisten ’ and blends, along with words formed through wordplay and alliterative compounding.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The question of where phonesthemes originate remains unanswered. Benczes (2019: 74–83) provides a good overview of the topic. Boussidan et al (2009: 36) suggest that they may have begun as morphemes in a proto-language, which ‘may have survived through generations’.…”

Section: Phonesthesiamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There is considerable debate over whether phonesthemes are morphemic (Benczes 2019: 84). Blust (2011: 407) characterizes phonesthemes as ‘submorphemes’, because they ‘can be identified by recurrence, but not by contrast’.…”

Section: Phonesthesiamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…It has been argued that poetry, both alliterative and rhyming, may serve to teach and reinforce phonesthetic associations (Benczes 2019: 76–7). Alliteration is the major characteristic of the oldest surviving Germanic poetry (Lehmann 1971: 4; Fortson 2010: 350).…”

Section: Phonesthesiamentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Phonesthetics and the etymologies ofbloodandbone

Pentangelo¹

2020

English Language and Linguistics

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The etymologies of English blood and bone are obscure. Although their cognates are well represented in the Germanic family, both lack clear cognates in other Indo-European languages. Various explanations for their origins have been proposed, including that they may be non-Indo-European (e.g. Hawkins 1987). Blood and bone, and their cognates, share an initial /b/ with numerous body-related words (e.g. beard, breast, bosom) throughout Germanic. This initial /b/ constitutes a phonestheme. Phonesthemes – ‘recurring sound-meaning pairings that are not clearly contrastive morphemes’ (Bergen 2004: 290) – are present in many Germanic languages, but their role in lexicogenesis is little understood. I suggest that blood and bone were formed by blending the initial /b/ phonestheme with two pre-existing lexemes: Proto-Germanic *flōda- ‘something that flows’ and *staina- ‘stone’. Phonesthetic blending may be a fruitful avenue for future etymological research.

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Snyre for your nasal congestion: Using phonesthemes to imbue non‐word brand names with meaning

Brennan,

Ilicic,

Danziger

2023

J Consum Psychol

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A brand name is a fundamental component of a brand's identity. This research introduces a novel linguistic tool for brand name creation: phonesthemes — sound and spelling letter clusters that are associated with one dominant meaning. For instance, sn, one of over 140 phonesthemes in English, consistently appears in words related to the nose or breathing (sneeze, sniff, snort). Six experiments reveal positive effects of phonesthemic non‐word brand names (e.g., Glif; gl‐; e.g., glow, glimmer; meaning ‘light’) on consumer preference, attitude, purchase intent, and choice when the dominant meaning activated by the phonestheme is semantically congruent with the product category or product attribute (e.g., luminant car wax), due to enhanced processing fluency. Phonological (sound) and orthographic (spelling) priming are eliminated as alternative explanations for the phenomenon. This research advances psycholinguistic research in marketing and the emerging area of brand linguistics by broadening the focus beyond brand name phonology.

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Rhyme over Reason

Cited by 19 publications

References 209 publications

Beauty and truth, truth and beauty: Chiastic structure increases the subjective accuracy of statements.

Beauty and truth, truth and beauty: Chiastic structure increases the subjective accuracy of statements.

Phonesthetics and the etymologies ofbloodandbone

Snyre for your nasal congestion: Using phonesthemes to imbue non‐word brand names with meaning

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