Dictionary

McGurk effect en · NOUN

Etymology

First described in 1976 in a paper by Harry McGurk and John MacDonald.

Meanings

1. A perceptual phenomenon where, when the auditory component of one sound is paired with the visual component of another sound, a third and different sound is perceived.
   • Finally, let us note two experiments that demonstrate a relation between the auditory and visual modalities that makes sense under the tight bond between particular articulatory and acoustic states implied by a phonological feature. In the so-called McGurk effect, subjects see a video display of a head saying [ba] repeatedly: [ba], [ba], [ba]. The video is synchronized with a recording of [ga], [ga], [ga]. […] subjects hear neither [ga], [ga], [ga] nor [ba], [ba], [ba], but [da], [da], [da] — an illusion whose effect is quite stunning. 1994 January 14, Michael Kenstowicz, “The Phonetic Foundations of Phonology”, in w:Phonology in Generative Grammar (Blackwell Textbooks in Linguistics), Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, →ISBN, section 4.5, page 191:
   • Conversely, and most crucially, McGurk effects for click consonant-vowel syllables were found to be equivalent to those for stop-vowel syllables. These results indicate that McGurk AV integration is strong for coarticulated stop consonant-vowel syllables, but much weaker for isolated release bursts, regardless of whether they are from native or non-native consonants, or are perceived as speech or as non-speech. 2020, Catherine T. Best, “Perception of Non-native Click Consonant Contrasts: Implications for Theories of Speech Perception”, in Bonny Sands, editor, Click Consonants (Empirical Approaches to Linguistic Theory; 15), Boston: Brill, →DOI, →ISBN, page 194:

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