# The bouba-kiki effect in baby chicks, with Dr. Maria Loconsole Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/grammar-girl-for-writers-and-language-lovers-159700/the-bouba-kiki-effect-in-baby-chicks-with-dr-maria-loconsole Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/grammar-girl-for-writers-and-language-lovers-159700/the-bouba-kiki-effect-in-baby-chicks-with-dr-maria-loconsole.md Podcast: [Grammar Girl: For Writers and Language Lovers.](https://stenobird.com/podcast/grammar-girl-for-writers-and-language-lovers-159700) Published: 2026-06-18T09:00:00+00:00 Episode link: https://shows.acast.com/grammar-girl/episodes/1195 Audio file: https://sphinx.acast.com/p/open/s/69c1476c007cdcf83fc0964b/e/6a2c4202252d86e84646338f/media.mp3 Processing state: not_requested JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/grammar-girl-for-writers-and-language-lovers-159700/episodes/the-bouba-kiki-effect-in-baby-chicks-with-dr-maria-loconsole Duration seconds: 1028 ## Resource 1195. This week, we talk to Dr. Maria Loconsole from the University of Padua about her research into the bouba-kiki effect, the near-universal tendency to associate round shapes with "bouba" sounds and spiky shapes with "kiki" sounds. We look at what her experiments with newly hatched chicks reveal about whether this association predates language entirely.  " Matching sounds to shapes: Evidence of the bouba-kiki effect in naive baby chicks " 🔗  Join the Grammar Girl Patreon. 🔗  Share your familect recording in  Speakpipe  or by leaving a voicemail at 833-214-GIRL (833-214-4475) 🔗  Watch my  LinkedIn Learning writing courses . 🔗  Subscribe to the  newsletter . 🔗  Take  our advertising survey . 🔗  Get the edited  transcript here . 🔗  Get  Grammar Girl books . | HOST: Mignon Fogarty | Grammar Girl is part of  the Quick and Dirty Tips podcast network . Audio Engineer: Dan Feierabend Director of Podcast: Holly Hutchings Advertising Operations Specialist: Morgan Christianson Marketing and Video: Nat Hoopes, Rebekah Sebastian Podcast Associate: Maram Elnagheeb | Theme music by  Catherine Rannus . | Grammar Girl Social Media:  YouTube .  TikTok .  Facebook .  Threads .  Instagram .  LinkedIn .  Mastodon .  Bluesky . Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. ## Actions - request_transcript: `POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/grammar-girl-for-writers-and-language-lovers-159700/episodes/the-bouba-kiki-effect-in-baby-chicks-with-dr-maria-loconsole/transcription-requests` — Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode. - read_markdown: `GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/grammar-girl-for-writers-and-language-lovers-159700/the-bouba-kiki-effect-in-baby-chicks-with-dr-maria-loconsole.md` — Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource. A page view does not enqueue transcription. Agents should invoke `request_transcript` explicitly when they need this episode processed. ## Transcript Full transcripts are not published on public pages unless there is a clear rights basis.