Does Foreign-Accented Speech Affect Credibility? Evidence from the Illusory-Truth Paradigm.

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Linguistics
• Social Psychology

Background:

• Previous research suggested foreign accents reduce message credibility due to processing fluency.
• The illusory truth effect demonstrates that repeated statements are perceived as more truthful.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the effect of foreign accents on message credibility using the illusory truth paradigm.
• To examine whether social biases against foreign speakers influence truthfulness ratings.

Main Methods:

• A between-participant design exposed individuals to statements with native or foreign accents.
• Participants rated the truthfulness of repeated and new statements after a distractor task.
• A separate group assessed social traits of speakers with different accents.

Main Results:

• The illusory truth effect was replicated, with repeated statements rated as more truthful.
• No significant difference in truthfulness ratings was found between foreign-accented and native-accented speech groups.
• A negative social bias towards foreign speakers was observed but did not impact truth ratings.

Conclusions:

• Processing fluency does not solely explain the impact of accent on credibility.
• Social biases against foreign speakers do not necessarily diminish the perceived credibility of their statements.
• The illusory truth effect is robust across different speech accents.