Accents in Business Communication: An Integrative Model and Propositions for Future Research
Today's
business interactions are characterized by encounters between people with
diverse language backgrounds. This article examines how, why and under what
circumstances regional or foreign speech patterns affect consumer judgments and
reactions. Building on a synthesis of accent research and theories, including
the work of related disciplines such as linguistics and social psychology, this
article suggests an integrative model that helps to understand accent effects
in business contexts. The model disentangles the effects of social
categorization, stereotype activation, and speech processing that jointly influence
different business-related outcomes. The model highlights three categories of
factors that moderate these accent effects, namely sender, receiver, and
communication variables. The paper further identifies several issues which
remain unresolved and which require continued research. An agenda for future
research sets out several propositions to help researchers approach regional
and foreign accents in business environments.
Mai, R.; Hoffmann, S. (2014). Accents in Business Communication: An Integrative Model and Propositions for Future Research, Journal of Consumer Psychology, 24 (1), 137-158.