Pavel Trofimovich

‘Your voice only counts if it sounds a certain way’ (Mah). This message resonates with many who have felt the impact of speaking with a stigmatised accent. Accent bias—unfair assessment of individu...

Accented second language (L2) speakers are frequently evaluated less favorably than first language (L1) speakers in employment contexts. Processing fluency (the subjective ease of understanding a speaker) has been identified as an experiential variable that helps explain why L2 speakers tend to receive lower workplace-relevant evaluations. However, less is understood about how processing fluency affects downstream judgments like speaker employability or competence. Drawing on the concept of lay theories, we examined whether listeners’ essentialist beliefs about accented and gay-sounding speakers moderated the relationship between processing fluency and employability judgments. We present a post hoc analysis of data from 192 listeners who rated the employability of gay- and straight-sounding L1 and L2 speakers of English. Listeners who more strongly endorsed beliefs that accents are diagnostic of speaker characteristics and amenable to speaker control showed a stronger association between processing fluency and employability ratings. The effect of accent beliefs was most pronounced when the speaker was difficult for listeners to understand, in which case stronger essentialist beliefs were associated with particularly low employability ratings. Essentialist beliefs about gay-sounding men did not moderate the fluency–employability relationship, consistent with the absence of reliable differences in listeners’ processing fluency with gay- and straight-sounding speakers in this sample. We provide exploratory evidence that lay theories of what accents reveal about speakers help explain when and for whom processing fluency might affect employment-relevant judgments.

Many people experience workplace-related biases because of how they speak, which stems from listener processes including social categorization (placing speakers into groups), stereotyping (forming simplified beliefs about speakers), and processing (dis)fluency (struggling to understand speakers). However, it is unclear how these processes account for evaluations of speakers with intersecting, voice-cued identities across different job contexts. We recruited 192 listeners to assess the employability of men whose speech marks them as first (L1) or second (L2) language speakers and as gay- or straight-sounding men. The speakers were presented as applicants for jobs considered gay- or straight-typed and involving high or low communication demands. Besides employability, listeners evaluated speakers’ sexual orientation and ease of understanding (comprehensibility as processing fluency). Straight-sounding L1 speakers received the highest employability ratings, followed by straight-sounding L2 speakers and gay-sounding L1 speakers, with gay-sounding L2 speakers ranked lowest. Processing fluency mediated the effect of language status, with L1 speakers rated as more employable partly because they were more comprehensible. Job communication demands (but not job stereotypicality) interacted with speaker effects, where L1 and straight-sounding speakers were perceived as more employable in low-communication jobs. We discuss how speaker identity, job context, and listener experience shape evaluations.

Accurate self-assessment is notoriously difficult for many second language (L2) speakers as they struggle to align self-evaluations of their performance with external assessments by raters or examiners. We investigated whether a brief peer-assessment activity helps L2 speakers align their self-assessment of comprehensibility with the evaluations by external raters. We also explored how speakers’ metacognitive knowledge contributes to their self-assessments. We recorded 40 L2 English-speaking international students completing an academic oral summary task and self-assessing their speech for comprehensibility. Half of the students then performed a brief peer-assessment activity, whereas the other half engaged in a filler task before all students self-assessed their initial performance again. The speech of all students was subsequently evaluated for comprehensibility by 30 external listeners, allowing us to estimate the extent to which the students’ and the external raters’ assessments converged. Whereas engaging in peer-assessment was generally associated for L2 speakers with greater alignment between their self-ratings and external listeners’ evaluations, peer-assessment appeared to mainly benefit L2 speakers with initially good self-assessment skills. Metacognitive knowledge was not associated with greater alignment between self- and other-assessments. We discuss whether and how brief peer- and self-assessment awareness-raising activities can help L2 speakers calibrate self- and other-assessments.

While research on accent bias has demonstrated the potential real-world impact of speaking with a second language accent, the results of this work rarely make their way into the hands of practitioners. Inspired by participatory action research models, this contribution responds to calls to more actively engage community members in research. Co-researchers in the current project include 18 individuals in two cities, Montreal and Burnaby (Canada): six academic facilitators, seven undergraduate HR management majors, and five community members unaffiliated with a university. The collaborative work included an introductory workshop focused on the establishment of a shared understanding of accent bias along with a series of co-design and implementation meetings. The work culminated in the creation of 10 mini-projects focused on raising awareness about accent bias. We share details of the process, insights from community members, and recommendations for those wishing to undertake a similar journey.

People are frequently concerned about the impressions they make on others (referred to as metaperceptions), but their insights are often inaccurate. Illustrating the phenomenon called the liking gap, speakers interacting in their first language (L1) and second language (L2) tend to underestimate how much they are liked by their interlocutor, and these judgments often predict their desire to engage in future interaction and collaboration. To understand the scope of this bias and its consequences, we focused on L1–L2 dyadic interaction, examining metaperception as a potential barrier to conversations between university students. We recruited 58 previously unacquainted university students to perform a 10-min academic discussion task between one L1 and one L2 speaker. Afterward, the speakers (a) assessed each other’s interpersonal liking, speaking skill, and interactional behavior; (b) provided their metaperceptions of their interlocutor’s assessments of the same dimensions; and (c) estimated their interest in future interaction with the same interlocutor. All speakers showed a reliable metaperception bias to underestimate their interpersonal liking, speaking skill, and interactional behavior. However, only L1 speakers’ desire to engage in future interaction was associated with their metaperceptions of interpersonal liking. We discuss implications of this finding for understanding and promoting academic communication.

This study examined the role of discourse organization in second language (L2) comprehensibility ratings. Twelve English for Academic Purposes teachers listened to 60 L2 speech samples elicited through a TOEFL–type integrated speaking task, evaluating each sample for comprehensibility and coherence (perceived interconnectedness of ideas). The samples were analyzed for the occurrence of discourse features at micro and macro levels. Results revealed a strong association between coherence and comprehensibility (r= .70). Whereas L2 speakers’ use of additive connectives (e.g.,and) uniquely predicted comprehensibility, ordering of ideas and source–speech similarity in speakers’ performances predicted coherence. Lexical overlaps predicted both constructs. Findings underscore the importance of coherence to comprehensible academic L2 speech demonstrating that the two constructs include partially overlapping yet distinct characteristics.

Previous research has shown that speakers’ visual appearance influences listeners’ perception of second language (L2) speech. In Québec, Canada, the context of this study, pandemic mask mandates and a provincial secularism law elicited strong societal reactions. We therefore examined how images of speakers wearing religious and nonreligious coverings such as medical masks and headscarves influenced the comprehensibility (listeners’ ease of understanding) and intelligibility of L2 French speech. Four L2 French women from first language (L1) Arabic backgrounds wore surgical masks while recording 40 sentences from a standardized French-language speech perception test. A total of 104 L1 French listeners transcribed and rated the comprehensibility of the sentences, paired with images of women in four visual conditions: uncovered face, medical mask, hijab (headscarf), and niqab (religious face covering). Listeners also completed a questionnaire on attitudes toward immigrants, cultural values, and secularism. Although intelligibility was high, sentences in the medical mask condition were significantly more intelligible and more comprehensible than those in the niqab condition. Several attitudinal measures showed weak correlations with intelligibility or comprehensibility in several visual conditions. The results suggest that listeners’ understanding of L2 sentences was negatively affected by images showing speakers’ religious affiliation, but more extensive follow-up studies are recommended.

Research on heritage language (HL) development often focuses on immigrants’ identity and social network as predictors of HL maintenance. However, an important and overlooked factor is the socio-political circumstances that trigger emigration, such as whether immigrants relocate due to economic hardship or political turmoil. This study examines if the pattern of HL maintenance and its association with immigrants’ ethnolinguistic identity and social engagement differ for families of political versus economic immigrants. Participants were 38 parent–child pairs from Montreal’s Vietnamese diaspora. The parents identified their reason for immigration and completed an ethnolinguistic questionnaire, their children provided a HL communication profile, and all participated in interviews. To determine participants’ Vietnamese speaking skills, short interview excerpts were rated for accentedness, comprehensibility, fluency, and global knowledge. Participants were generally successful at maintaining their HL, but there was a decline in the children’s Vietnamese, especially for the economic immigrants. Several ethnolinguistic variables (desire to preserve a HL, pride in heritage culture) and social network properties (network size, intimacy, communication-related stress) appeared to contribute to HL maintenance. However, these relationships were different (and sometimes opposite) in the groups of political versus economic immigrants, suggesting that HL development and maintenance are subject to various contextual influences.