Why do some people pick up accents so quickly, whereas other people never change their accent?

[CalIie]

Just a question I have never had a satisfactory answer to.

I pick up accents ridiculously quickly. For example, when talking to my friends in Canada over the phone I will pick up a Canadian accent, I'll suddenly notice I am saying "aboot" or something and then become very self-conscious.

Similarly, when my Welsh grandfather was alive I would go Welsh over the phone.

My cousin and her husband moved to Australia 9 years ago. Her husband developed a full on Ozzy accent within a year, yet she still sounds very English, there is not even an Ozzy twang.

What about you guys? And any thoughts as to why this is?

That explains why I having been back in Ireland longer than I was in England, still have this awful hybrid accent. Exaggerated at times, English vowels when I forget. 🤔
I listen to voice notes after Ive sent them and I think "oh, no wonder im not getting promoted/invited"

I met an american once who was married to english woman. She had a proper Kent accent and so did he when he was with her. But he worked in the us military and spoke with his american accent there.

So bizarre - he basically switched accents like people switch languages depending who they are talking to.

Oh yeh, totally possible. I knew a traveller who went to ucd and he was more than capable of putting on the "righttt" accent. I was amazed. I suppose i had thought of the traveller accent as a handicap but he didnt have to use it. He could slip in to other accent(s)
I used to work with another traveller though, he did not play to the crowd at all.

This is utterly fascinating. A lot of my work involves asylum seeker/refugee children and it's so interesting how some of the children speak English with a fairly local accent quite quickly and others are still speaking with their own language's twang? after several years.
Also met some Traveller children who speak with very thick Irish accents despite never living in Ireland.

I’ve wondered about this. When I lived in Australia the people who had emigrated years ago who kept their accents seemed to have northern Irish, northern England accents. People who’d emigrated from southern England/london seemed to have strong Aussie accents. Took my kids 3 weeks when we got there to pick it up and then 3 weeks to go back to a uk accent (after being there for 3 years)

This is really interesting.

My family moved around the country a lot when I was growing up and I don't have any particular accent but have picked up bits from each area- so my accent does really match any one area.

DH has lived in the same town all his life but temporarily adopts new accents very quickly. To the extent that I can tell immediately who he has been speaking to that day based on how he sounds when he comes home from work. On holidays he tends to pick up bits of the dialect and accent of whoever he is speaking to most that day, which can be cringe inducing.

I do this, completely invluntarily, and then cringe inside when I realise in case the person thinks I'm taking the piss out of their accent. I have terrible social anxiety and strongly suspect I have ASD, so I've always wondered whether it's that.

DD's friend lived in America since birth (English parents). They moved back to England and friend has completely lost her American accent. Probably easy enough as her parents never had much of an accent. Yet her sister still has a strong american accent.

In my case, I suspect it's not empathy as I'm pretty lacking on that front. I grew up abroad though and have travelled quite a bit. After University I ended up interviewing mostly foreign nationals for a Government department and my colleagues found it hilarious.

I'm an actor, and have done a fair bit of work with professional voice coaches on various accents.

It's actually quite technical stuff. You start with a lot of physical warm ups of your mouth, tongue, face and jaw. You focus on where in your mouth certain sounds are "placed" in your mouth in the accent your working on, on what the tongue is doing (is it drawn back in the mouth or placed behind the teeth, for example), on how much the lips and mouth move (in general, Americans open their mouths more and use the lips more than Brits, we tend to be quite "tight-lipped"), as well as on the pace, pitch and rhythm of the accent.

So I wonder if, just as some people are physically built to be better at running, for example, people who do this naturally more flexible and adaptable mouths and jaws?

My mum is from the Caribbean and she totally lost her accent and basically spoke English as someone from England except when she shouted.
When she used to get angry and shout at me and my sister we used to burst out laughing because it was like a different person in the house.

When I see people quickly doing it I feel like they have a weak personality and can have their opinion swayed easily.

Good grief, @Jobseeker19. Really? A weak personality?

Empathy is a strength and not a weakness.

@Gilead

For those of us who are Autistic, it’s echolalia, we can’t help it!

Oooh, I didn't know there was a word for it, although I had associated it with my autism!

Dh and I are from different areas of Scotland and grew up with very local accents and very different accents to each other. We both ended up moderating our accents to fit in with work where we'd mainly be speaking to either English people or people abroad. We generally revert to our own accent when visiting each side of our family. When we had children and moved to a completely different area with it's own accent, a lot of family speculated about what accent DC would have.

They don't have the local accent, they have a generic Scottish accent that you honestly couldn't place. I guess in one way it's sad that they don't have something that identifies them as "from" any particular place and most particularly the place they have been brought up, but they still sound Scottish so should be able to fit in anywhere

Like so many others on this thread, I do the same mimicry of the accent of whomever I'm speaking with (although I quite often find myself doing a completely random accent, most frequently Scottish, too). Im a mixed race, third culture kid in a mixed marriage who's lived overseas for much of my life and to be honest, I don't know what MY own accent would be. It's totally unconscious, I don't realise I'm doing it and really struggle to stop even when I am aware. The explanation that it's part of a desire to belong and be accepted rings very true to me.
But... interviewing people and speaking at public events is a large part of my professional role and quite frankly (especially given some of the responses here) it's embarrassing and I'd love to stop it. Has anyone had any success in this or could recommend any techniques to help?

It depends on the person, I have a mix of Nottinghamshire and north London when speaking English. I have a very strong Pakistani accent when speaking Urdu, including when I speak Urdlish.

My husband has a Swedish accent despite living in the UK from eight (posh boarding school).