summary on accent development

[Ting T Chung]

Hi Childes members,

A (long) while ago I posted a message for references on accent development
in children and even infants. I have since finished my PhD dissertation on
accent categorization in infancy (University of Pittsburgh.)

Here's what I found: Infants born in Pittsburgh can discriminate the New
York Bronx accent from the Western Pennsylvania accent at 10, but not 4,
months. They can also discriminate the New York Bronx accent from the
Chinese accent in English (both novel to the baby) at 10 months, although
the effect is not as strong. They are unable, however, to discriminate 2
accents in a foreign language (Chinese) at both ages.

The dissertation has a good (or at least I think so!) documentation
of findings on adult, child and infant perception/acquistion of various
accents and dialects.

Here is a summary of messages I received in response to the message I
posted at Childes:
---------
>From Nicole Whitworth
Department of Linguistics & Phonetics
The University of Leeds
Leeds
LS2 9JT
UK

you want to have a look at work done by G. Docherty (University of
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, UK) and P. Foulkes (University of York, UK), as well
as
P. Kerwill (University of Reading).
------
>From Lynne Hebert Remson

I can only offer anecdotal disconfirming evidence.  I moved to Arizona
from Louisiana when my daughters were 9 and 12.  The 12 year old "decided"
to lose her Southern/Cajun accent-you know how junior high girls can be--
and it disappeared in about 2 weeks.  The younger one, now 19, still has a
great deal more evidence of it, as do I.  Most people don't guess that my
12 year old, now 22, is from Louisiana unless they know her last name.
-------
>From Tina Bennett-Kastor

A friend of mine from graduate school was born and
raised in Los Angeles. Her parents were New York Jews.
Her dialect was that of a New York Jew, not someone
born and raised in L.A. The family was very close,
and were members of a close-knit Orthodox Jewish
community, so perhaps that had something to do with it.
-------
A few people also mentioned Labov's work, who definitely has a significant
role in this literature.

Many thanks to those responded!

Rachel Chung, PhD
=======================
ting at pitt.edu

Data Manager
Psychophysiology Lab
Department of Psychology
University of Pittsburgh
4310 Sennott Square
S. Bouquet St.
Pittsburgh, PA 15260
(412)624-8191