How do you tackle not being able to understand an accent?

[FindingMeno]

Particularly in settings such as medical ones where its important to understand what is being said?
I am always so worried about appearing rude, especially if I have already said I'm having trouble following what is being said and I then still don't understand.
How is the best way to deal with this? What do you do?

Because as yoi can see from here, some people think it's better to end up harmed because you couldn't understand than to ask, and some people will feel too worried about being labeled a thick racist.

I tell them I’m sorry, but I don’t understand what you are saying. But, that would also apply to some British regional accents.

But there are really is a limit on how many times you can ask someone to repeat themselves.

I had a doctor with a really thick accent and I really didn't understand what she was asking.
It was unsafe practice.

Ah, so understands everyone from around the world but doesn’t understand a Scottish accent?

Sounds about right!

Just remembered, when I was about to start a new job in my mid twenties, I had to ring and finalise a few things. I called the number and a woman announced ‘Mon Toyne’. I was a bit confused because it was nothing like the name of the company. I asked for the appropriate person anyway and thankfully was put through. The building was comprised of different companies, but the receptionist was employed by ours and dealt with calls for the whole building. I heard her say ‘Mon Toyne’ every day for about a fortnight before I finally worked out she was saying ‘Lamont House’. Our building🤣🤣🤣 She was putting on this weird posh voice to answer the phone and sounded completely normal the rest of the time.

I'm terrible with accents, could never understand my MIL so just spent my rime nodding along and hoping i wasn't agreeing to anything I'd regret. Didn't help that she'd randomly drop words in from her own language if she couldn't remember the English.

I sympathise OP!

Some of the responses on this thread are truly bizarre. Not everyone has the same auditory processing abilities. My husband was born and raised just down the road from me but sometimes I really struggle to understand what he's saying. His work colleagues apparently don't have this problem so I have to accept that it's me. And yes I've had my hearing checked, no detectable issues.

I haven't been in the situation of being unable to understand someone purely due to an accent but if I do encounter that I'd apologise and make sure to put my friendly face on (when I'm concentrating my face goes completely blank, or so I'm told) so they don't misinterpret my request that they repeat themselves as hostility. That's all you can do really.

@Luckyingame @Piglet89 tagging you both as I find the subject fascinating.

Lots of my frequent contacts are in the UK for 4-5 years and then return home again. One of them is Slovenian and his accent since he moved to the UK c. 5 years ago and now has changed dramatically.

I imagine part of it is spending all day every day for five years speaking to people with a particular accent. Given his role he's usually talking to very middle/upper class, British and so he has slightly developed a 'drawl' (imagine Eton/Royal Family) which 'masks' the Slovenian accent quite well, although it still 'slips' (as he describes it) if he is easily excitable or vexed. Speaking to him, unless you knew he was Slovenian or were familiar with the accent I don't think you'd really twig now.

My Slovenian colleague is also quite a slow speaker as he considers what he says before he speakers - in comparison I have a Czech colleague who speaks incredibly quickly, has the same contacts and social circles and has been here a similar amount of time, and her accent is still very pronounced. So I wonder if that's a factor?

Either way, absolutely fascinating. I've noticed American/South African and Aussie accents don't tend to change that much after a sustained period of time in London. Neither does the French one...now I think about it.

When DH was deployed to Brussels, he came back with the strangest accent I've ever heard - a mix between English, French/English and a weird Texan twang as his main American counterparts were all from states around Texas. I couldn't understand a word he said for about a month 😫

I presume this is a joke? My elderly Dad is often in hospital, and I have to get updates by phone. It's often very hard to understand what the nurse is telling me, because of a heavy foreign accent. I can't just "pretend" that I know the diagnosis, can I? I have to ask them to repeat things, so that I can understand exactly what's happening and prepare accordingly. 🙄

You do what my DH does.

"Sorry, I have a hearing impairment and have particular difficulties with accents, please can you write that down for me".

Or alternatively "due to my hearing impairment I need to record this so I don't miss anything important"

The worse time for this with my DH was a lovely bloke with a really heavy Scottish accent!

I've noticed American/South African and Aussie accents don't tend to change that much after a sustained period of time in London.

I once worked with a woman from the US who had lived in the UK for several years (not London). To me she sounded American, but she said that when she went home, everyone told her she sounded British.

There was a Danish footballer, Jan Molby, who played for Liverpool. He spoke pure Scouse.

I also think that medical language is so unfamiliar to most people that it makes everything so much harder anyway.

I get told I sound "posh" or southern when I go north to my home, yet in the South where I've lived 20 years, I often get asked if I'm from Liverpool (I'm not) or told they can't understand me due to my heavy northern accent!

My hard of hearing elderly father is always too polite to say when he can’t understand an accent. The speed at which people talk is a problem also. He can go through an entire consultation smiling and nodding so as not to upset anyone, then ask about it afterwards.

I don't think you (and many others) understand about hearing loss. There are no grounds for your assumption at all.

Making sense of what someone is saying is a two stage job: Tiny hairs in the ear are dedicated to particular frequencies, and when these are detected messages are sent to the brain, which then makes meaning out of them. As these hairs degrade then the frequencies they pick up on become harder to hear, but they don't all die off at the same time or the same rate.

If specific frequencies are missing from your hearing, your brain is already having to work with limited information. If a particular accent then removes some of that already limited information (for example by not articulating consonants or by speaking so quickly they don't form words clearly) then that accent is going to be very difficult to understand whatever volume it comes at. Getting a better hearing aid might help if you haven't completely lost the ability to hear a particular frequency, it can boost whatever you are still able to pick up. But if the hair cells in your ear that are responsible for a particular frequency are dead, they can't be brought back to life.

If the sound input is less than ideal, the brain will look for help where it can, using contextual cues, lipreading etc. Accents vary in the additional help they give. Some don't move the mouth much and these are harder to understand than those that do.

The situation matters as well, You will have plenty of contextual clues if you're making small talk about the weather, but far fewer if you're trying to take in an unfamiliar topic.

So I can completely understand why someone with a hearing issue would struggle to make sense of some accents in a hospital setting.

I'm honest, a simple " I'm very sorry can you speak slower as I'm struggling to understand you. " if you don't tell people then they can't adjust to help. I suffer from severe tinnitus from 20% hearing loss in my left ear.

I do find accents tricky as it adds another layer onto trying to hear someone

My DS had emergency surgery at less than 6 weeks old. The admitting doctor drew a diagram because I couldn't understand what he was saying to me, and I'm not convinced he understood me well either.

The language barrier did not help an already extremely stressful situation.

I am a HCP, and honestly yes sometimes I can’t understand patients (sometimes accents, sometimes medical reasons). I do tend to just say “I’m sorry, I have a hearing impairment but I do want to understand what you are saying, would you mind speaking slowly and clearly for me?” And then you just ask them to keep repeating themselves, and keep checking that you’ve heard them right.

Paper and pen also helps, and I have been known to open word and type things out on a screen in a large font when I get totally stuck.

Nothing wrong at all IME StationJack, providing it's not said rudely

I used to recruit in an area and demographic which involved the vast majority of applicants being south asian, and while - perhaps not unnaturally - I became very used to the accents, occasionally there'd be one who simply couldn't make themselves understood

At that point I'd invite them to apply again when their spoken English was more developed, and because I made it clear they'd still be considered when this had happened it rarely caused problems. The very few who claimed this was racism were asked why, then, someone from the same demographic would usually be appointed, to which there came no answer

Typo

Because (a) you risk sounding rude and (b) if they don’t really understand what you are saying then it carries on ad finitum

It did seem a bit harsh but I'm from an area with it's own accent and have moved areas a few times.
The person who said it was not a native English speaker.
I just took it to mean that maybe my accent was stronger than I thought. I didn't take offence.

This is true, but while maybe I've been lucky I've never known a medic who'll use the more difficult terms with a patient

So rather than stating you need a cholecystectomy they'll explain the gallbladder needs to come out, instead of saying something's idiopathic they'll make clear the cause isn't known and so on

Or perhaps I just come across as being so dense they realise they'll need to do this

I'm don't think I've seen many, if any, blanket statements about accents on this thread. Most who're commenting about difficulties with accents are reflecting on their own personal experiences or that of people close to them.

Just as well I'm typing this rather than speaking to you. I spent much of my life in Glasgow so based on what you said earlier, you probably wouldn't understand because of my accent.

@Greenwitchartthats great the NHS saved your life.

That doesn’t mean it contains no staff whose strong accents are incomprehensible to others. Neither does it mean it’s racist to point that fact out.

Ironically perhaps, but I usually find medical staff that use the actual terminology rather than the explain-it-to-them-like-they're-five versions far easier to understand.

Latin tends to make people speak far more clearly - just try saying total abdominal hysterectomy with bilateral salpingooophrectomy without moving your lips - although my being able to understand/lipread such things is at least partly due to years spent working for the NHS with audio dictation.