Abstract
Multiple studies demonstrate that social and linguistic information is connected in speech perception such that the priming of a social category will affect listeners' linguistic behavior. At the same time, the degree to which social information is relied upon during speech perception is less well understood. The current study investigates whether priming of a country affects the perceived degree of foreign accent and whether this effect varies across different social groups. Two groups of bilinguals (one dominant in Russian, another dominant in English) listened to audio recordings of monolingual and bilingual (also either dominant in Russian or English) speakers and rated the degree of their foreign accentedness in English and Russian. The recordings were divided by topic: neutral, Russia-related, and Australia-related. Statistical analysis revealed a significant effect of topic: Russia-related clips were rated as more foreign-accented in English by bilinguals dominant in Russian, and Australia-related clips were rated as less foreign-accented in Russian when produced by bilinguals dominant in English. The variation is explained through listeners' using social information more when the linguistic information is less reliable.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 101-121 |
Number of pages | 21 |
Journal | Linguistics |
Volume | 59 |
Issue number | 1 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 1 Jan 2021 |