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American accent make surprise placement in survey of worlds friendliest accents
A new survey revealed that most people find Americans to have the friendliest accent in the world, followed by other countries like Great Britain and Australia.
It is well documented that people make snap judgements on someones personality based on their accent. One survey found that 62% of people believe that others had made judgements about them based on their accent on subjects including job prospects, level of attractiveness, and intelligence.
Americas placement might surprise you
Hoping to delve further into the idea of friendly accents, MinimumDepositCasinos.org conducted a global study of 5,000 participants.
The study found that 19.5% of people found that Americans had the friendliest accents, followed by British at 13.6% and Australian at 8.8%.
In fourth place came Canadian at 8.7%, followed by German (5.7%), French (5.5%), Scottish (3.2%), Italian (3.0%), Austrian (3.0%), and Spanish (2.8%).
Despite Preplys study revealing that Irish is the third sexiest accent, only 2.8% of people ranked the island nation accent as friendly. In tenth place came the Indian accent, with 2.2%.
Further study is required
It is, however, worth noting that there is no singular American accent beyond what people might stereotypically envision. There is, in fact, quite a distinct difference between accents from Boston and Virginia, New York and Los Angeles.
Dr. Christopher Strelluf, Associate Professor of Linguistics at The University of Warwick, explained this in great detail.
More nuanced accent labels would likely reveal even greater variability, she said. For instance, Americans would probably have different evaluations of the friendliness of English they associate with the big cities of the northeastern seaboard compared with the rural areas of the southeastern US.
Many people in the UK would feel that accents of the English North are much friendlier than those of the English South, the professor added.
Something worth considering
Despite the studys glowing perception of American accents, it is worth better understanding what accent bias is, and how it could have contributed to the answers of those who participated.
Accent bias is described as an unwarranted and unjustifiable prejudice toward individuals and communities who speak a language with an accent different from the dominant culture.
As such, someones own stigmatised beliefs could play into their ideas about what makes an accent, and its people, friendly.
