Children, like adults, use three visible cues—race, gender and age—to arrange their social world. They prefer to make friends with kids similar to them on these traits. New research shows that verbal accents may be equally important in guiding youngsters’ social decisions—in fact, accents may be even more important than race.
Working at Harvard University, developmental psychologist Katherine D. Kinzler and her colleagues first showed American five-year-olds photographs of different children paired with audio clips of voices and asked which ones they preferred as a friend: a child who spoke English, one who spoke French, or one who spoke English with a French accent. Even though the subjects understood the French-accented English, they were almost four times more likely to choose the native English speaker as a friend.
Going one step further, Kinzler and her team showed that an accent is more meaningful than race in signifying whether someone belongs in your social group. Replicating previous research, they found that under silent conditions children chose as potential friends children of the same race. Yet when the potential friends spoke, white children preferred a black child speaking with a native accent over a white child who spoke English with a foreign accent.
Why was accent more important than race? “Race, as a psychological category, may be relatively modern in terms of human evolution,” explains Kinzler, now at the University of Chicago. In prehistoric times, “a neighboring group might have sounded different even if they did not look different,” she says. Preference for our own race might have developed later, after the more ancient preference for our own accent. The next step is to see whether living in bilingual or multilingual countries might change this early inclination.
This article was originally published with the title Accents Trump Skin Color.
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20 Comments
Add CommentIs it possible that white children will not select children with black accents? Perhaps the reason why some whites do not like blacks or some blacks do not like whites is because whites speak in a white dialect and many blacks speak in a black dialect. Recently, Harry Reid said that Obama had a chance of winning the election because the now-President was a light-skinned black with no Negro dialect. Is it possible the reason why so many whites voted for Obama has less to do with whether he is light-skinned or dark-skinned and more related to Obama's ability to speak with a white accent? Also, I'm curious about the specific kinds of accents used in the study. Were children exposed to a French accent equally less likely to want to make the child in the picture a friend as children exposed to a British accent or a Northern accent or a Western accent or a Southern accent? Would Southern children be less likely to choose Northern accented children as friends? Would Western children be less likely to choose Western accented children as friends? When children watch television, do they prefer cartoons with children who speak in the Southern, Northern, Western, or British accent?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOops, I meant: Would Western children be less likely to choose Southern accented children as friends?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThese are all very good research questions, most of which, to my knowledge, have not been examined with children. I think that it would be interesting to see which accent children would select if presented white/foreign accent; black/standard accent; black/non-standard accent. My intuition is that children would still prefer the foreign accent less than black/non-standard accent. Some research that has been done on children and regional accents (in France and Britain) shows that they are not good at discriminating between different regional accents of their native language, especially at such a young age. This implies that they would also like the French accented child less than a native speaker with a Southern or Western accent. British accent in itself would be interesting because it is a native English accent as well, and one that among adults is perceived as very prestigious. Moreover, children from a very young age are exposed to accent stereotypes through cartoons, in which British accents tend to be portrayed in a more positive way than other accents (e.g., German or Russian). This is the case in movies in general.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAccent definitely plays a role in White-Black relations in the US, but accent is only one part of African American Vernacular English, which is more often categorized as a separate dialect or language that differs from Standard American English on other linguistic dimensions as well. Nevertheless, there is evidence that adults are prejudiced against AAVE, so if Obama did not speak Standard American English, he would probably have lower chances of success (same way as Palin's accent was used against her in the elections). It is also more acceptable in the society to discriminate against one's accent than race or ethnicity (for example, Former Governor of California Gray Davis, said about Arnold Schwarzenegger: You shouldn't be governor unless you can pronounce the name of the state. ). However, I am not sure whether an accent would be enough for Obama to lose the elections since there were so many other factors at play.
I have longed believed that culture, which includes accents, is far more important to integrating a society than colour (race). Accents are only the tip of the iceberg in the subtly nuanced difference there are in culture. Human beings are extremely adept at reading those nuances making it very difficult for a new comer to a society change, hide or overcome the cultural differences that distinguish them from the host community.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTYPO FIXES -- I have long believed that culture, which includes accents, is far more important to integrating a society than colour (race). Accents are only the tip of the iceberg in the subtly nuanced differences there are in various cultures. Human beings are extremely adept at reading those nuances, making it very difficult for a new comer to a society change, hide or overcome the cultural differences that distinguish them from the host community.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHistorically speaking, race is a very recent concept—the modern sense of race developed in the 18th century. Tribe is what usually matters to cultures, and an accent is an indicator of tribal belonging.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere's no way Barack Obama would get elected if his accent sounded "street." His election depended heavily on reassuring white Americans that he was a non-threatening person. White Americans have been conditioned to associate the black "street" accent/idiom with hostility to white people.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI remember a teacher from Ghana who taught English at a culturally and racially diverse California high school. Her accent caused more problems with the Black students who often "complained" that they could not understand her. This "complaint" was largely fabricated because many of the students--both white and Black-- did not want to comply with her high educational standards. However, it was most disturbing to observe the lack of respect displayed by the Black students.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI remember a teacher from Ghana who taught English in a culturally and racially diverse California high school. She had problems with students who often "complained" that they did not understand what she was saying because of her accent. The "complaints" were fabricated because of her high educational standards. Although the "complaints" came from all ethnic groups, proportionately, she received the highest number of "complaints" from the Black students--who also caused her the most behaviour problems.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisExcellent points on the differences between "race" and tribe differences. We need much more investigations as to reactions to "otherness", the us and them now more complex than ever in the global community in which we live. When asking young children about "having a friend" and "making a new friend" we run into the problem of that child's ability and or desire to make friends, a kind of introvert extrovert situation. There is also the threat as to personal status within a social group, the alpha male and alpha female vs. the very shy or the "loner" react differently to any newcomer, as we see on so many children's TV programs. What would happen if the question(s) were rephrased as to which child is "nicer", or which child would be or become most popular. As a teacher of foreign languages I observed that there are children who are open to the new language experiences and those that almost resent the "newness" or "otherness". At the tribal level this would play out as those that preserve or conserve their tribe and those that would be the ambassadors. As English is known for its ability to absorb any and all foreign influences, and other languages do not, are the reactions of their children similar? Do native English speakers react the same to the French accent as the native French speakers react to the English accent(s)?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn the UK and many of the UK's former English speaking colonies, accent was and is an indicator of social status and class. For my own part, when I have traveled to these same nations, I always tend to associate with individuals of both genders who have an "upper class" accent simply because I instinctively know that I have much in common intellectually, culturally, and socially with the same. I haven't experienced the same clear distinctions, based upon accent, in the USA.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI strongly agree with @way2ec. There has not been nearly enough study of reactions to "otherness". I believe that we would soon find that things like race and foreign accents are rather superficial distinctions masking much deeper and subtle "otherness" attributes. For example slight differences phrasing can locate the origin of people within the same national culture.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe ability to effectively communicate is a functional prerequisite for effective socialization. It should be no surprise that it would take precedence over all other social selection factors.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis fact does not infer anything about the developmental or evolutionary sequence of racial characteristics and language differences or psychological factors of social preferences, etc. This study determined only that if you can’t communicate, it’s very difficult to socialize.
I grew up multiculturally and spoke three languages by the time I went to kindergarten. The sound of my first language is still the one that evokes the warmest feelings.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor a slightly different angle on this, I grew up in the oil fields of Venezuela with friends whose parents came from all over the world, with the range of accents you would expect. Among the kids though, we developed a shared accent, which tends to sound like USA TV announcer accents. We only had Spanish-dubbed TV, so that couldn't have been the influence on our accent. I think we reached an accommodation about what our "tribal" accent would be.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisPerhaps I should have explained further. The conclusions reached by the reported research are speculative and invalid.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe only conclusion reported in the article: “Kinzler and her team showed that an accent is more meaningful than race in signifying whether someone belongs in your social group.”
The simple protocol employed asked five year old children to choose as a “friend”. Had they asked ten year old children who they’d chose to join their soccer team, I suspect they would have gotten much different results. The definition of social group used was not reported, but two five year old friends may qualify only under its most basic definition.
The article asks: “Why was accent more important than race [to five year olds selecting personal friends]?”
The simplest, most straightforward and obvious answer is that differing accents make communications more difficult and understanding more challenging, especially for children who have limited language skills.
The study author replied speculatively:
“Race, as a psychological category, may be relatively modern in terms of human evolution,” (In prehistoric times), “a neighboring group might have sounded different even if they did not look different.”
This seems to be a peculiarly psychological interpretation of the experimental results. I expect that experts in other related subject areas would not agree with this finding.
A friend of mine, who is Russian, told me that when he lived in Uzbekistan he thought the Uzbeki people with whom he worked were not very intelligent. I assume they spoke Russian at work, though I don't remember if he said as much.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLater, when he moved to the US and went for his first job interview, he realized he was the one who was not very intelligent...
This is a very important research exercise. Children will be honest participants. I am a grandmother to 2 interracial grandchildren, ages 3 and 1 1/2 years old.. My son is african american and the father/husband. My daughter-in-law is white and the mother/wife. Both children adore both their parents. I often wonder how these children view the world around them, especially family in terms of their 2 sets of grandparents (black and white). What I mean is: at any time does a question come to their minds regarding the difference in skin color. Any research??
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisElbunny, it's been my observation that the children do what children of any relationship do. They love both parents, and all their relatives based on their rapport with these individuals. Most of the correspondents on these subjects confuse cause and effect in the sense that rapport is the result of the sum total of commonalities. After that rapport is established, it is THEN the most salient feature of the individual is identified as the dominant identifier of that individual.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMost prejudice is usually an example of what is called reification. In reification we take an abstract concept, in this case color, and imbue it with qualities that we take from concrete things it has been associated with. So dirt is black, therefore we say black is dirty, by extension then white is imbued with the quality of cleanness or purity. It is a flawed and childish way of thinking but the pages of this science based dialog is rife with it.
When you're separated from a loved one, for example, you long to hear the sound of their voice, or feel a certain touch that tells you you're together again, but that's not the reason why you loved that person in the first place. Of course rapport is an ongoing thing it's not a constant, however that identifying feature lingers on long and carries through to other relationships.
In this case we have to bear in mind the observation that rapport is something that's built and changes over time. So that the initial contact that feeds rapport is the one that precedes even birth, that fills the home through rooms and is carried across space and around the world, the sound of an individual's voice.
So to answer your question, from personal observation, (which is a kind of research,) children do notice and make attributions on the differences in skin color, but these attributions are the result and not the cause of other far more important interactions.
Henry Higgins was right:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"An Englishman's way of speaking absolutely classifies him,
The moment he talks he makes some other Englishman despise him."