This confusion is an example of the Verbal Transformation Effect. The VTE is when an illusory change occurs when an acoustically presented word is repeated for prolonged periods. In this case, the "ki ki ki ma ma ma" are the sounds that are said over and over, making what we hear sound like "ch ch ch ah ah ah". And since we are all probably primed to hear the "ch ch ch ah ah ah" because of the media telling us that was the sound, it's probably another reason why we hear the wrong sounds.
So what if you STILL can't hear the "ki ki ki ma ma ma" in the video? Well take a look at the movie and watch Pamela Voorhees say her infamous line "kill her mommy". The "Ki" sound comes from when Pamela says "Kill" and the "Ma" sound comes from when she says "Mommy". With the help of some technology, reverb to the sound to be exact, this is how the creators of the movie made the "ki ki ki ma ma ma" sound. If we were to take the footage of Pamela saying the "ki" and the "ma" sound and put the audio over it, we could probably hear the sounds more accurately. But if we took video of Pamela mouthing the sounds "ch" and "ah" we would hear her say "ch ch ch ah ah ah" instead. This is an example of the McGurk Effect. The McGurk Effect happens when perception of an intermediate phoneme when auditory and visual speech cues conflict. So we could probably use this effect to our advantage to help people hear the correct sound.
Lastly because the sounds in the movie aren't actual words and there is no context to tell us what it is saying, this may be another reason as to why we hear the wrong sound. This is the same reason why we hear words from our native language in songs sung in a foreign language, we try to listen for what we know and understand in order to make sense of what we hear.
(Example of media priming the wrong sound)
-Chelsea Monheim
References:
http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803115457120
http://www.craveonline.com/mandatory/1038167-10-things-you-probably-didnt-know-about-friday-the-13th#/slide/1
Class Notes from Dr. Margolin's Cognitive Processes class
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ReplyDeleteAlthough the verbal transformation effect is plausible, it may not be applicable to this example. The reasoning being that the sound may not be prolonged enough have the verbal transformation effect. The video is about 9 seconds and we hear the phrase about 4 times, that may not be enough time to hear a variation in sounds from hearing "ki ki ki ma ma ma' to "ch ch ch ah ah ah". In the example we heard in class, with the song that Dr. Margolin we had to listen to the whole song before she asked if we heard "hot potato" instead of the actually words.
ReplyDelete-Aaliyah Stroman-Surita