Children aged five link certain accents with intelligence

Children from just five years old associate people with middle-class accents as being more intelligent than people with other accents, according to new research led by the University of Essex.

The study for the first time combined two research methods to see if young children were biased towards certain accents when it comes to cleverness.

Published in the Journal of Child Language, the team of linguistic experts collated the children’s brain activity using EEG (electroencephalogram) caps alongside measuring the speed of their answers to indicate how embedded their attitudes towards accents were.

Across all measures, the children associated someone with the Standard Southern British English (SSBE) accent – typically described as a middle-class accent – as being clever.

Although the Essex accent is usually stigmatised, it was not amongst the 27 Essex five-year-olds who took part in this study.

Instead, the children perceived their home accent as being clever on one of the brain measures, although this could be attributed to their familiarity with the accent, as studies have shown that in later life these Essex schoolchildren will grow to feel negatively towards their own accent.

Dr Ella Jeffries, from Essex’s Department of Language and Linguistics, who led the research said: “This study is a vital first step towards understanding the development of language attitudes throughout childhood. This work has important consequences for educational policy and practice in order to eradicate the harmful stereotyping of accents and promote the celebration of accent diversity at pivotal stages of childhood.”

The study, which also involved academics from the University of California, Davis, found that children who were exposed to a range of accents in the home were more positive towards different accents.

“Our findings will add weight to calls for a better range of accents on children’s TV and films to help address this bias. Also, given that stereotypes are prevalent in the media relating to certain accents it is not surprising young children have picked up on accent differences,” added Dr Jeffries.

“Ideally is would be good to see a better representation of a range of accents across the media, which do not play into these biases and which avoid always associating certain accents with certain characteristics.”

The researchers now hope to follow-up this small study by investigating a larger pool of children, across a bigger age range, to focus on a wider range of accents to develop a broader picture of how and when this accent bias first develops.