I like the way we talk: the effect of accent imitation on speech perception

Dr Patti Adank describes her topic: “The UK has many regional accents, from Cockney spoken in London to Geordie in Newcastle, to Scottish accents such as Glaswegian. In addition, many inhabitants of the UK speak English with a foreign accent.

When conversing with someone else with an accent different from our own, we may find ourselves starting to adopt the other’s style of speech, including features of their accent. Why do we do this and how does this imitative behaviour relate to our attitudes about the speaker’s accent? What are the neural bases underlying these processes?

In this talk I will (aim to) answer these questions by discussing behavioural and neuroimaging experiments that relate accent imitation to effective listening and affiliation between conversation partners.”