<p>Short answer: This is still debated, but it might be due at least partly to social stereotypes.</p>
<p><strong>Attitudes:</strong></p>
<p>There are many British accents, but the one most likely to be used in comparisons to say, American, Australian, or New Zealand accents is called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Received_Pronunciation" rel="nofollow noreferrer">RP</a>, or the Queen's English.  Other accents used include <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multicultural_London_English" rel="nofollow noreferrer">MLE</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estuary_English" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Estuary</a>, which are more common in modern times.  American accents also vary, and the one most commonly used in regional comparisons is called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_American_English" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Standard American English</a>, or GenAm, or Network English.  Much like RP, the Standard accent is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_prestige_dialects#E" rel="nofollow noreferrer">most common in broadcast media</a>.</p>
<p>Subject perceptions of accents are tested using the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matched-guise_test" rel="nofollow noreferrer">matched-guise</a> and similar verbal-guise paradigms, in which speakers read the same content in different accents, while listeners, unaware of the manipulation, are asked to rate the speakers on various traits.  A common finding in matched-guise research is that people in general <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.862" rel="nofollow noreferrer">prefer standard accents</a> over foreign accents, presumably due to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accent_perception#Social_identity_theory_of_accents" rel="nofollow noreferrer">in-group bias</a>.  However, can exceptions be made for native speakers of non-standard accents, such as the way Americans rate British accents?</p>
<p>An early study by <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0146167285111009" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Stewart, Ryan, &amp; Giles (1985)</a> suggested that Americans indeed perceive British speakers as higher status than own-accent speakers.  However, in a later study by <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9481.00136" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Bayard et al (2001)</a>, Americans rated the American accent higher than British on many traits, including intelligence and class.  Had attitudes changed in the intervening years?  Or is the difference <a href="https://doi.org/10.1515/mult.2005.24.3.211" rel="nofollow noreferrer">due to changes in method</a> used?  Results of other studies (eg, <a href="https://search.proquest.com/openview/336f7b5cabae57e0cc7859aebb51eb25/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&amp;cbl=1817376" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Scott, Green, &amp; Rosewarne, 1997</a>; <a href="https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/How-Accents-Affect-Perception-of-Intelligence-%2C-%2C-Anderson-Downs/f080ba11e631ede0f3ca539c1e812b2eb3b7e1a6" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Anderson et al, 2007</a>; <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00909889409365409" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Gill, 2009</a>; <a href="https://www.acrwebsite.org/volumes/14622/volumes/v36/NA-36" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Wang et al, 2009</a>) also question Americans' preference for the British accent.  Even if a preference for the British accent exists among Americans, it may only reflect the RP accent (eg, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0008413100010343" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Trudgill, 1983</a>).</p>
<p><strong>Reasons:</strong></p>
<p>Several hypotheses have been proposed for why listeners might have preferences for some accents over others:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>The inherent value hypothesis is favored by many lay people - when asked about their preferences, they often claim that certain accents just &quot;sound better&quot;.</p>
</li>
<li><p>The imposed norm hypothesis suggests that certain accents are &quot;standard&quot; in a given culture, and consequently preferred over non-standard accents.</p>
</li>
<li><p>The social connotation hypothesis is a variation that suggests that traits are associated with accents through social stereotypes, influenced by media.</p>
</li>
</ol>
<p>An interesting way to test these hypotheses is to compare listener preferences when they don't recognize the accents that they are asked to rate.  To this end, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00335637409383249" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Giles et al (1974)</a> asked Brits to rate Greek accents, and Giles, Bourhis, &amp; Davis (1979) asked Welsh to rate French accents.  Native speakers of the rated accents report clear preferences for one accent over another; however in both studies, listeners with no knowledge of the rated languages were unable to discern the accents and gave speakers similar ratings.  This result challenges the inherent value hypothesis.</p>
<p>Furthermore, native speaker ratings do not correlate well with how similar accents are to the &quot;standard&quot; accents, challenging the imposed norm hypothesis.  A study reported by <a href="https://doi.org/10.1017/S0008413100010343" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Trudgill (1983)</a> also demonstrated that native English speakers that can discern British accents give accents different ratings depending on which region or country the listener is from, contrary to both the inherent value and imposed norm hypotheses.  Finally, ratings can differ significantly depending on what trait is measured (eg, intelligence, class, solidarity, success).  Consequently, the social connotation hypothesis tends to be the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prestige_(sociolinguistics)" rel="nofollow noreferrer">dominant theory</a> in current scholarship.</p>
<p><strong>Controversy:</strong></p>
<p>However, while some later studies (eg, <a href="https://eprints.lancs.ac.uk/id/eprint/125858" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Leemanna, Kollyb, &amp; Nolan, 2015</a>) corroborate the social connotation hypothesis, others lend support to the inherent value hypothesis (eg, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S0271-5309(98)00008-1" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Ladegaard, 1998</a>; <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0883-2919.2005.00411.x" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Hiraga, 2005</a>; <a href="https://hdl.handle.net/1959.11/19947" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Gooskens, Hilton, &amp; Schüppert, 2016</a>; <a href="https://hdl.handle.net/1811/91694" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Wadas, 2020</a>).  It is also possible that accent cannot always reliably be separated from other differences in speech, or that subjects unable to discern accents have nonetheless developed implicit associations through media exposure.  Additionally, accent preferences don't always align well with media stereotypes as reported by subjects.  More research is needed.</p>
<p>If the social connotation hypothesis is correct, then preference for the British accent may be the result of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglophile#American_Janeites" rel="nofollow noreferrer">American Anglophilia</a> - basically, the British have done a good job of branding themselves overseas.  Indeed, subjects from many countries (eg, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/ijal.12139" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Spain</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9841.2010.00442.x" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Norway</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/09658416.2011.592590" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Japan</a>) prefer the British accent, but others (eg, <a href="https://doi.org/10.5539/ells.v1n1p86" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Iran</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01434632.2012.734509" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Korea</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/S0271-5309(98)00008-1" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Denmark</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9481.00136" rel="nofollow noreferrer">New Zealand, and Australia</a>) seem to prefer the American accent - attributed to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Americana" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Pax Americana</a>, or the USA doing a good job of branding themselves in those countries.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-10-29T00:27:16.813Z
I applaud you and thank you for the research, this answer gives me exactly what I’m looking for!
Cotton Headed Ninnymuggins
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-10-28T23:30:35.457Z
2020-10-28T23:30:35.457Z
Arnon Weinberg
<p>This question has to do with how people perceive other accents. It seems that having a British accent makes someone seem more intelligent, even though that isn’t always true.</p>
<p>As funny as it is, I think someone with a British accent could approach me and start talking about dogs sniffing each other’s butts and I would still think, “man, this guy really does knows what he’s talking about.”</p>
<p>I have done some searching, but it seems there isn’t a definite answer answer for why a British accent makes someone appear sophisticated.</p>
<p>The top answer <a href="https://www.quora.com/Why-do-British-accents-sound-intelligent-to-Americans" rel="noreferrer">here</a> suggests that maybe the association has to do with people’s original perception of those people to begin with. If you thought British people were smart and you heard someone with what you thought was a British accent you may be quick to think that person is smart.</p>
<p><a href="https://sites.psu.edu/siowfa16/2016/09/06/why-does-a-british-or-new-zealand-accent-sound-more-intelligent/" rel="noreferrer">This</a> suggests the theory that the association could come from countries historical dominance.</p>
<p><strong>What explains why (a lot of Americans for sure) think someone with a British accent must be smart?</strong></p>
<p>Note: I’m not sure about good tags for this question</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-10-08T13:00:48.487Z
There are a lot of different accents in Britain. London has 2 major accents - cockney is very different to the other and both are very different to Newcastle Geordie and the Manchester accents. Which accent are you referring to?
Chris Rogers
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-10-08T13:24:00.013Z
It seems that most or possibly all British accents get clumped into 1 accent. If you were British, I would assume you probably couldn't tell the difference between a Midwestern and Northeast accent in the US any more than I could tell the difference between those dialects.
Cotton Headed Ninnymuggins
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-10-26T00:52:06.977Z
I'm not so sure about this assertion "(a lot of Americans for sure) think someone with a British accent must be smart.". Could you refer to some studies that have this conclusion? To my ear (a foreigner, not a native English speaker), American accent sounds more modern, but neither accent seems to be smarter than the other. For me, with the same sentences spoken in the same context and same situations by similarly capable speakers, it's hard to believe that any accent should sound smarter than any other. Isn't it only the content of the speech and the way the speech is conveyed that matter?
user287279
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-10-26T00:53:50.937Z
“British accents conjure stereotypes of high IQ and competence while Brooklyn and Southern accents get lower ratings on intelligence.  This is not necessarily consistent with actual IQ scores, but the perception persists just the same.  Psychologists also found that children living in Chicago rated northern accents as “smarter” and southern accents as “nicer.”  Children from Tennessee, however, showed no such preference (Kinzler and DeJesus, 2012).” Found that [here](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/modern-minds/201609/why-do-british-accents-sound-intelligent-americans)
Cotton Headed Ninnymuggins
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-10-26T07:05:18.093Z
Thank you for the article. I agree that some accents are associated with some types of social status, education background, and (certainly) ethnicity. I just wonder if the specific assertion I referred to above has been supported by some good academic studies, that is, if it is a scientific fact or just a myth. I’ve searched the net about this matter, and, yes, this belief seems to be held widely on the net, but none of the articles I’ve found referred to any good-quality researches. On the contrary, the one study that I’ve found doesn’t support this assertion (see the citation below).
user287279
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-10-26T07:06:02.727Z
“ … Statistical significance was obtained on physical attractiveness ratings and on intelligence ratings. p<.05. The results do not support accent prestige theory. ...” from T  Samantha Anderson, et al. ["How Accents Affect Perception of Intelligence, Physical Attractiveness, and Trustworthiness of Middle-Easter-, Latin-American-, British- and Standard-American-English-Accented Speakers,"](https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1060&context=intuition)
 Intuition: The BYU Undergraduate Journal of Psychology: 2007; Vol. 3 : Iss. 1 , Article 3.
user287279
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-12-03T07:26:34.557Z
I totally agree that there is something about a cultured British accent that sounds superior. I have a PhD in geochemistry but still, for some strange reason, think certain British accents make the person sound superior. I am from New England and noted when I was a young man (now 66) that some preppy people spoke at that time in a Boston Brahman accent that raised the hackles on my neck. Are they really more intelligent? Of course not! However, the inflections and smooth pauses between words conjures a thoughtfulness during speech that suggests a deeper intellect. Very strange!
Michael S
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-12-05T15:42:39.273Z
I love that Brit accent. To me it's more a sophisticated thing. You know the Queen's English. Mick Jagger. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWAUrHODRWM This is a good example. A school kid in Wales being interviewed.
Derek
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-12-07T08:18:38.690Z
I certainly don't agree with this statement.
AliceD
<personality>
Why does a British accent sound smarter to Americans?
Cotton Headed Ninnymuggins
# Why does a British accent sound smarter to Americans?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2020-10-07)

This question has to do with how people perceive other accents. It seems that having a British accent makes someone seem more intelligent, even though that isn’t always true.

As funny as it is, I think someone with a British accent could approach me and start talking about dogs sniffing each other’s butts and I would still think, “man, this guy really does knows what he’s talking about.”

I have done some searching, but it seems there isn’t a definite answer answer for why a British accent makes someone appear sophisticated.

The top answer [here](https://www.quora.com/Why-do-British-accents-sound-intelligent-to-Americans) suggests that maybe the association has to do with people’s original perception of those people to begin with. If you thought British people were smart and you heard someone with what you thought was a British accent you may be quick to think that person is smart.

[This](https://sites.psu.edu/siowfa16/2016/09/06/why-does-a-british-or-new-zealand-accent-sound-more-intelligent/) suggests the theory that the association could come from countries historical dominance.

**What explains why (a lot of Americans for sure) think someone with a British accent must be smart?**

Note: I’m not sure about good tags for this question

**Tags:** personality

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: There are a lot of different accents in Britain. London has 2 major accents - cockney is very different to the other and both are very different to Newcastle Geordie and the Manchester accents. Which accent are you referring to?  
> **username_0**: It seems that most or possibly all British accents get clumped into 1 accent. If you were British, I would assume you probably couldn't tell the difference between a Midwestern and Northeast accent in the US any more than I could tell the difference between those dialects.  
> **username_2**: I'm not so sure about this assertion "(a lot of Americans for sure) think someone with a British accent must be smart.". Could you refer to some studies that have this conclusion? To my ear (a foreigner, not a native English speaker), American accent sounds more modern, but neither accent seems to be smarter than the other. For me, with the same sentences spoken in the same context and same situations by similarly capable speakers, it's hard to believe that any accent should sound smarter than any other. Isn't it only the content of the speech and the way the speech is conveyed that matter?  
> **username_0**: “British accents conjure stereotypes of high IQ and competence while Brooklyn and Southern accents get lower ratings on intelligence.  This is not necessarily consistent with actual IQ scores, but the perception persists just the same.  Psychologists also found that children living in Chicago rated northern accents as “smarter” and southern accents as “nicer.”  Children from Tennessee, however, showed no such preference (Kinzler and DeJesus, 2012).” Found that [here](https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/modern-minds/201609/why-do-british-accents-sound-intelligent-americans)  
> **username_2**: Thank you for the article. I agree that some accents are associated with some types of social status, education background, and (certainly) ethnicity. I just wonder if the specific assertion I referred to above has been supported by some good academic studies, that is, if it is a scientific fact or just a myth. I’ve searched the net about this matter, and, yes, this belief seems to be held widely on the net, but none of the articles I’ve found referred to any good-quality researches. On the contrary, the one study that I’ve found doesn’t support this assertion (see the citation below).  
> **username_2**: “ … Statistical significance was obtained on physical attractiveness ratings and on intelligence ratings. p<.05. The results do not support accent prestige theory. ...” from T  Samantha Anderson, et al. ["How Accents Affect Perception of Intelligence, Physical Attractiveness, and Trustworthiness of Middle-Easter-, Latin-American-, British- and Standard-American-English-Accented Speakers,"](https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1060&context=intuition)  Intuition: The BYU Undergraduate Journal of Psychology: 2007; Vol. 3 : Iss. 1 , Article 3.  
> **username_3**: I totally agree that there is something about a cultured British accent that sounds superior. I have a PhD in geochemistry but still, for some strange reason, think certain British accents make the person sound superior. I am from New England and noted when I was a young man (now 66) that some preppy people spoke at that time in a Boston Brahman accent that raised the hackles on my neck. Are they really more intelligent? Of course not! However, the inflections and smooth pauses between words conjures a thoughtfulness during speech that suggests a deeper intellect. Very strange!  
> **username_4**: I love that Brit accent. To me it's more a sophisticated thing. You know the Queen's English. Mick Jagger. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWAUrHODRWM This is a good example. A school kid in Wales being interviewed.  
> **username_5**: I certainly don't agree with this statement.  

---

## 1 answers

### Answer by username_6 on 2020-10-28. Score: 3 | Accepted answer

Short answer: This is still debated, but it might be due at least partly to social stereotypes.

**Attitudes:**

There are many British accents, but the one most likely to be used in comparisons to say, American, Australian, or New Zealand accents is called [RP](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Received_Pronunciation), or the Queen's English. Other accents used include [MLE](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multicultural_London_English) and [Estuary](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Estuary_English), which are more common in modern times. American accents also vary, and the one most commonly used in regional comparisons is called [Standard American English](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_American_English), or GenAm, or Network English. Much like RP, the Standard accent is [most common in broadcast media](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_prestige_dialects#E).

Subject perceptions of accents are tested using the [matched-guise](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matched-guise_test) and similar verbal-guise paradigms, in which speakers read the same content in different accents, while listeners, unaware of the manipulation, are asked to rate the speakers on various traits. A common finding in matched-guise research is that people in general [prefer standard accents](https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.862) over foreign accents, presumably due to [in-group bias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accent_perception#Social_identity_theory_of_accents). However, can exceptions be made for native speakers of non-standard accents, such as the way Americans rate British accents?

An early study by [Stewart, Ryan, & Giles (1985)](https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0146167285111009) suggested that Americans indeed perceive British speakers as higher status than own-accent speakers. However, in a later study by [Bayard et al (2001)](https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9481.00136), Americans rated the American accent higher than British on many traits, including intelligence and class. Had attitudes changed in the intervening years? Or is the difference [due to changes in method](https://doi.org/10.1515/mult.2005.24.3.211) used? Results of other studies (eg, [Scott, Green, & Rosewarne, 1997](https://search.proquest.com/openview/336f7b5cabae57e0cc7859aebb51eb25/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=1817376); [Anderson et al, 2007](https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/How-Accents-Affect-Perception-of-Intelligence-%2C-%2C-Anderson-Downs/f080ba11e631ede0f3ca539c1e812b2eb3b7e1a6); [Gill, 2009](https://doi.org/10.1080/00909889409365409); [Wang et al, 2009](https://www.acrwebsite.org/volumes/14622/volumes/v36/NA-36)) also question Americans' preference for the British accent. Even if a preference for the British accent exists among Americans, it may only reflect the RP accent (eg, [Trudgill, 1983](https://doi.org/10.1017/S0008413100010343)).

**Reasons:**

Several hypotheses have been proposed for why listeners might have preferences for some accents over others:

1. The inherent value hypothesis is favored by many lay people - when asked about their preferences, they often claim that certain accents just "sound better".
2. The imposed norm hypothesis suggests that certain accents are "standard" in a given culture, and consequently preferred over non-standard accents.
3. The social connotation hypothesis is a variation that suggests that traits are associated with accents through social stereotypes, influenced by media.

An interesting way to test these hypotheses is to compare listener preferences when they don't recognize the accents that they are asked to rate. To this end, [Giles et al (1974)](https://doi.org/10.1080/00335637409383249) asked Brits to rate Greek accents, and Giles, Bourhis, & Davis (1979) asked Welsh to rate French accents. Native speakers of the rated accents report clear preferences for one accent over another; however in both studies, listeners with no knowledge of the rated languages were unable to discern the accents and gave speakers similar ratings. This result challenges the inherent value hypothesis.

Furthermore, native speaker ratings do not correlate well with how similar accents are to the "standard" accents, challenging the imposed norm hypothesis. A study reported by [Trudgill (1983)](https://doi.org/10.1017/S0008413100010343) also demonstrated that native English speakers that can discern British accents give accents different ratings depending on which region or country the listener is from, contrary to both the inherent value and imposed norm hypotheses. Finally, ratings can differ significantly depending on what trait is measured (eg, intelligence, class, solidarity, success). Consequently, the social connotation hypothesis tends to be the [dominant theory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prestige_(sociolinguistics)) in current scholarship.

**Controversy:**

However, while some later studies (eg, [Leemanna, Kollyb, & Nolan, 2015](https://eprints.lancs.ac.uk/id/eprint/125858)) corroborate the social connotation hypothesis, others lend support to the inherent value hypothesis (eg, [Ladegaard, 1998](https://doi.org/10.1016/S0271-5309(98)00008-1); [Hiraga, 2005](https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0883-2919.2005.00411.x); [Gooskens, Hilton, & Schüppert, 2016](https://hdl.handle.net/1959.11/19947); [Wadas, 2020](https://hdl.handle.net/1811/91694)). It is also possible that accent cannot always reliably be separated from other differences in speech, or that subjects unable to discern accents have nonetheless developed implicit associations through media exposure. Additionally, accent preferences don't always align well with media stereotypes as reported by subjects. More research is needed.

If the social connotation hypothesis is correct, then preference for the British accent may be the result of [American Anglophilia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglophile#American_Janeites) - basically, the British have done a good job of branding themselves overseas. Indeed, subjects from many countries (eg, [Spain](https://doi.org/10.1111/ijal.12139), [Norway](https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9841.2010.00442.x), [Japan](https://doi.org/10.1080/09658416.2011.592590)) prefer the British accent, but others (eg, [Iran](https://doi.org/10.5539/ells.v1n1p86), [Korea](https://doi.org/10.1080/01434632.2012.734509), [Denmark](https://doi.org/10.1016/S0271-5309(98)00008-1), [New Zealand, and Australia](https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9481.00136)) seem to prefer the American accent - attributed to [Pax Americana](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Americana), or the USA doing a good job of branding themselves in those countries.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: I applaud you and thank you for the research, this answer gives me exactly what I’m looking for!  

---

