Foreign accent and imcredibility

2010/09/05 Aulestiarte Lete, Izaro - Elhuyar Zientziaren Komunikazioa

• Giza zientziak

Today millions of people speak in a different language than their mother tongue. The world of work often puts us internationally.

Surely, by accent and no, most of us on more than one occasion would have had some very strange situation with some foreigner, more in summer. However, in some way, although often between mimic and smile, in most cases we get to communicate or understand each other.

A team of researchers from the University of Chicago directs their research on foreign accent to a field that goes beyond understanding. According to the study, talking to the accent reduces credibility. “It is clear that the accent of a non-local speaker hinders the understanding of what he has said; in that sense, there is no novelty. But the truth is that we tend to confuse these difficulties of understanding with the credibility of expressions, even if unconsciously. And that was not accredited,” said the researcher.

For this, psychologists have been based on an experiment with a group of volunteers. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology has published the results.

Prejudices

Through language and accent, disparate situations often arise.

In order to know if the accent affects credibility, volunteers were encouraged to listen to a few phrases and evaluate them. One of them, for example, said in English: “Without water, a giraffe can last longer than a camel.” These words were heard in the mouth of several people: some speakers had English as their mother tongue, but others did not.

Given the influence that any prejudice can have on the realization of such a measure, and trying to counteract the possible effect of these convictions, the experiment was divided into two parts.

In the first, the volunteers did not know what the research was about; the speakers who listened only explained that they were reading the texts of a booklet. Well, the words of accented foreigners were less credible and the amount of accent also affected valuations. According to the scale of credibility specific to the experiment, an average score of 7.5 was awarded to the English, 6.95 to those of foreign average accent and 6.84 to those of harder accent.

“Because of the accent, the volunteers had difficulty understanding the words of those who did not speak English. And this problem of understanding was directly related and confused with the lack of credibility,” the researchers say.

If we take into account the results of the investigation, the list of those affected can be long: immigrants seeking work, who have to work in business with foreign citizens…

In the second experiment, however, the public was alerted directly to the development of the research. Although the recording they heard was similar to the previous one, other results were obtained: they attributed the same degree of credibility to the opinions of English speakers and speakers with medium foreign accent. The assessment only varied in those cases where the accent was very marked.

They are only data from research. But if the results are indicators of a general trend in society, researchers say that all this can give what to think. Immigrants looking for work, foreigners who want to defend their innocence, “accent” journalist who has to report the news…, the list of “direct harms” can be long.

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