Dialect and authography: some differences between American and British spellers

Two experiments examined whether American and British university students make different kinds of spelling errors as a function of the differences between their dialects. The American students spoke a rhotic dialect, pronouncing an /r/ in such words as leper, hermit, horde, and gnarl. The British students, with their nonrhotic dialect, did not include an /r/ in such words. The dialect differences led to different spelling errors in the 2 groups. For example, the British students sometimes misspelled horde as "haud" because its vowel has the alternative spelling au in their dialect. They sometimes spelled polka as "polker" because its final vowel is often spelled as er in other words. The U.S. students were much less likely to make such errors, although they did make other errors that reflected aspects of their dialect. Phonology, far from being superseded by other strategies in the development of spelling, continues to be important for adults.