High-Pitched Sound is Open and Low-Pitched Sound is Closed: Representing the Spatial Meaning of Pitch Height

Research shows that high- and low-pitch sounds can be associated with various meanings. For example, high-pitch sounds are associated with small concepts, whereas low-pitch sounds are associated with large concepts. This study presents three experiments revealing that high-pitch sounds are also associated with open concepts and opening hand actions, while low-pitch sounds are associated with closed concepts and closing hand actions. In Experiment 1, this sound-meaning correspondence effect was shown using the two-alternative forced-choice task, while Experiments 2 and 3 used reaction time tasks to show this interaction. In Experiment 2, high-pitch vocalizations were found to facilitate opening hand gestures, and low-pitch vocalizations were found to facilitate closing hand gestures, when performed simultaneously. In Experiment 3, high-pitched vocalizations were produced particularly rapidly when the visual target stimulus presented an open object, and low-pitched vocalizations were produced particularly rapidly when the target presented a closed object. These findings are discussed concerning the meaning of intonational cues. They are suggested to be based on cross-modally representing conceptual spatial knowledge in sensory, motor, and affective systems. Additionally, this pitch-opening effect might share cognitive processes with other pitch-meaning effects.