The Impact of Spatial Cognition on Cross-Modal Interaction between Emotional Semantics and Auditory Perception

According to the embodied cognition view, abstract concepts, including emotional ones, are grounded in our sensorimotor experience of the physical environment. For example, emotionally positive words (happiness) are associated with the upper part of vertical space, whereas the nega-tive ones (desperation) are linked with the lower parts of physical space. Interactions between different represen-tational domains are expressed, among others, in the so-called cross-modal corre-spondence effect - facilitation of stimulus processing in one modality by congruent aspects of information presented in anoth-er modality (e.g., high-pitch sound - high vertical location). The present study attempted, for the first time, to induce this effect using auditory stimuli of varied pitch and emotional words with defined spatial connotations. Thirty-six volun-teers (26 women, 18-34 years old) were simultaneously presented with 1000 or 2000 Hz tones and words of varied emo-tional valence that had been rated for their spatial associations in vertically ori-ented space. The participants' task was to identify the pitch of the presented tone as high or low. The analysis of reaction times using a linear mixed-effects model demon-strated statistically significant differences between congruent (e.g., emotionally pos-itive word - high tone) and noncongru-ent conditions, as well as between congru-ent and neutral conditions. The effect of cross-modal correspondence was also evaluated for each stimulus word as well as for high and low tones separately, showing its specificity to high-pitch sounds and a subset of words. In sum, the results showed a cross-modal correspon-dence effect that spans across different levels of cognitive processing: from per-ceptual analysis of auditory signals to ver-bal semantic processing of complex abstract ideas. Importantly, we also present a set of Russian-language nouns rated for their spatial and emotional properties that can be used in future psycho-and neurolinguistic studies on embodied semantics.