Children’s perception of accent distance for native and nonnative varieties

Abstract

Adults are sensitive to the presence and strength of accents different from their own. Children also are sensitive to the presence of unfamiliar accents, but much less is known about their awareness of accent strength. To address this gap, this study used a ladder task, in which listeners rank talkers based on their perceived distance from the home standard. Female adult talkers representing four native, six nonnative, and one bilingual English accents were included. Six-year-olds, 12-year-olds, and adults completed two ladders in which all talkers produced the same sentence and one ladder with a unique sentence for each talker. Average rankings were significantly correlated across age groups, with greater agreement for consistent than unique sentence ladders. Strategies used by six-year-olds differed from older children and adults. The youngest children arranged talkers into two or three distinct groups with more horizontal groupings while older children and adults primarily arranged talkers in a vertical array. These results support previous findings that young children distinguish their own accent from unfamiliar accents. Furthermore, the study provides new data demonstrating that sensitivity to accent distance emerges in the early school-aged years with continued maturation during middle childhood. [Work by NSF grants 1941691 and 1941662.]