Some Accents More Attractive Than Others

Question 1

Thomas Pear

Answer 1

1931- People have different perceptions of a speaker according to the accent they heard them talk with

Question 2

‘Matched Guise Approach’

Answer 2

Involves participants listening to the same speaker using a range of different accents then passing judgement to each different variant.

Question 3

Giles Matched Guise 1975

Answer 3

Researching Birmingham accent. Same speaker using 2 different accents speaking about psychology, teenaged rated RP speaker higher in terms of competence and intelligence.

Question 4

Giles Matched Guise 1973

Answer 4

British teens presented with a speech arguing against the death penalty, spoken in diff accents. More likely to value argument & content of speaker with more prestigious accent

Question 5

Who supports Giles?

Answer 5

Dixon, Mahoney & Cocks 2002. Used approach to see if correlation between someone’s accent and how we perceive someone’s guilt. Participants listened to a dialogue between a 👮‍♂️ and suspect, some suspects had Birmingham accent others more standard. The subject was perceived to be significantly more guilty when he spoke non-standard Birmingham

Question 6

Trudgill 2000

Answer 6

‘Children with working class accents and dialects may be evaluated by some teachers as having less educational potential than those with middle-class accents and dialects’

Question 7

The Daily Telegraph

Answer 7

Business executives admitted that if you have a working class Essex accent, they might have doubts about hiring you

Question 8

Disagree- BBC website

Answer 8

‘Voices’. 75% of people in UK think they hear a lot more accents in every day life & on BBCTV and Radio than they used to. 78% enjoy hearing a variety of accents

Question 9

1972 Seligman, Tucker & Lambert

Answer 9

Found that teacher’s perceptions of students were heavily influenced by their speech. Choy& Dodd 1976- teachers make judgements on a student’s ability & their personality based on the way they speak