Researchers at the Department of English Language at the University of Glasgow have been given a major grant by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) to study the potential effects of television on pronunciation in Glaswegian adolescents

Previous research on the English spoken in Glasgow found that certain features of pronunciation more usually associated with southern English are creeping into the Glaswegian parlance. (Think bruvver instead of brother or toof instead of tooth.)

It was previously thought that this kind of change spread through face to face interaction and increased geographical mobility. The Glasgow results challenge this because the children who displayed these tendencies were not the younger more mobile middle-class speakers, but typically non-mobile working class adolescents.

This led to the speculation that the media, and in particular, exposure to soaps, might be responsible. But until now there has been no systematic research to investigate this.

Jane Stuart-Smith, principal investigator, explained: " Our research is ground-breaking in that it is the first attempt to consider systematically the effects of television on the way we pronounce language."

The project tackles the question of the effects of televesion on accent by looking in particular at the possible effects of the types of Cockney accent shown on television on the everyday speech of Glasgow teenagers.

Claire Timmins, ESRC fellow at the University, added:

"As well as devising an experiment to investigate any possible short term direct effects of television on accent, we are also looking at the evidence for links between linguistic features and exposure to television. Our investigation also looks at the wider social lives of our informants, their friends, family, leisure pursuits and interests."

The project has been running since September 2002 but has only now gone public so that data collection could be completed without any known influence from local media reports.

Jane Stuart-Smith concluded, 'We are now looking forward to analysing the data and finding out whether television does indeed play a part in accent change. Our work will help us to understand better the different roles of personal and mediated communication in human interaction.'

Media Relations Office (media@gla.ac.uk)

Jane Stuart-Smith (0141 330 6852) or Claire Timmins (0141 330 2078) Dept of English Language

Judith Hodgson (0141 330 3535) or Mike Findlay (0141 330 8593) University of Glasgow Press Office

Lesley Lilley (01793 413119) ESRC Press Office

The ESRC is the UK's largest funding agency for research and postgraduate training relating to social and economic issues. It provides independent, high-quality, relevant research to business, the public sector and Government.

The ESRC invests more than ?76 million every year in social science and at any time is supporting some 2,000 researchers in academic institutions and research policy institutes. It also funds postgraduate training within the social sciences to nurture the researchers of tomorrow.

More at ESRC

First published: 4 March 2004