The term ordinal linguistic personification (OLP) was introduced in 2007 by Julia Simner and Emma Holenstein for a form of synesthesia they were able to describe for the first time as the result of a case study. The test person A. P. stated to be capable not only of perceiving colors for some numbers, letters, and months, but also to be able to consistently assign them a gender and a specific character. Even more, the numbers and letters were characterized by a certain typical behavior and were related to one another. In the number 8, for example, A. P. saw an overweight woman who was dating the 9 although she was really in love with the 7. The 7 was a weak, insecure man who of all the numbers preferred to be seen with the 6. Furthermore, m and n were old, gossipy women. And June was a pretty, popular, and somewhat conceited girl whose best friend was July. It appeared that relationships only existed within a single category and, moreover, only between successive elements: k, for example, could be l’s mother, but not of a or the number 5. Simner and Holenstein also suspect that these associations are determined by the historical and cultural background of a person. They point to specific occupational groups or types of people that are characteristic of the period from which the individual reports originate. The authors nevertheless believe that OLP is a form of synesthesia, since features such as involuntary occurrence as well as long-term consistency can be observed. In addition, Simner and Holenstein were able to find evidence that OLP synesthetes are frequently grapheme-color synesthetes as well. This is a further indication that OLP is a variation of synesthesia, as different synesthetic characteristics often occur together.

Recommended Reading:

Julia Simner and Emma Holenstein (2007) “Ordinal Linguistic Personification as a Variant of Synesthesia,” Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience 19, no. 4, 694–703.

Also refer to:

Julia Simner and Edward M. Hubbard (2006) “Variants of Synesthesia Interact in Cognitive Tasks: Evidence for Implicit Associations and Late Connectivity in Cross-Talk Theories,” Neuroscience 143, 805–814.