Chemotherapy drugs are usually named to evoke a sense of “lightness” and “quickness,” which may make them appear “more tolerable,” Dartmouth linguistics professor Lewis Glinert reports in his research paper, “Chemotherapy as language: Sound symbolism in cancer medication names.” The paper was published in April in the journal Social Science and Medicine.
Sound symbolism is the notion that the sound of any word, however miniscule, may greatly reflect unique qualities of that word or object, including size and strength. Glinert, and Gregory Abel ’91, from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, have discovered that cancer medications are often composed of sounds and consonants that are associated with “lightness” and “quickness.” The names favor voiceless consonants /p/, /t/, /k/, /f/ and /s/ over the “slower” and “heavier” voiced consonants of /b/, /d/, /g/, /v/ and /z/. This may change a patient’s attitude towards a particular medication, Glinert said. The researchers stressed, however, that these effects are quite subtle.
“The voiceless sounds have a higher acoustic frequency,” Glinert said in an interview. “Not only that, but there is also a whole range of variations such as the extended ‘e’ versus the long ‘u,’ harsh, animalistic sounds versus soft sounds and much more.”
Using specific data evaluation and statistical studies, Abel and Glinert found that there was a higher frequency of these “voiceless consonants” in the naming of cancer medication than there was in standard English. This higher frequency raises several important questions for cancer medication, cancer patients and providers.
Drug trade names, including those used for cancer medications, are subjected to an approval process, including critical examination from the United States Adopted Name Council, the World Health Organization and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
“The name of a drug is a major marketing attribute,” Glinert said. “For drugs, depending on the type, a physician may hope that a patient will treat it with a lot of respect, or for example, the physician will prescribe another type of drug in which the patient will not be too hesitant to take it.”
Glinert expressed a strong concern for the need for better communication between health care providers and patients. Above all, this move towards “patient empowerment” aims to “encourage awareness on the part of healthcare providers of the patient’s own need to speak and voice their concerns,” Glinert said.
“Time is critical,” Glinert said. “Time to listen to the patient, and time in medical school needed to teach these skills…it is unfortunate that there are so few health literacy chairs at major universities.”
In the future, Glinert said he plans to study the effects of drug commercials and how companies present the medication on television and the internet. He said he hopes to participate in the creation of information boxes on drug packaging that will help patients make better decisions about the types of medications they are taking.
Further reading:
Abel, Gregory A. and Glinert, Lewis H. “Chemotherapy as language: Sound symbolism in cancer medication names.” Social Science & Medicine. Volume 66, Issue 8, April 2008, Pages 1863-1869.