Lang Soc. 2, 177-192. Printed in Great Britain

Towards a theory of interpersonal accommodation through language: some Canadian data1HOWARD GILESUniversity of Bristol

DONALD M. TAYLOR AND RICHARD BOURHISMcGill University2ABSTRACT

The study was designed to investigate the process of speech accommodation between bilinguals from two ethnolinguistic groups. It was hypothesized that the greater the amount of effort in accommodation that a bilingual speaker of one group was perceived to put into his message, the more favourably he would be perceived by listeners from another ethnic group, and also the more effort they in turn would put into accommodating back to him. Eighty bilingual English-Canadians were divided into four groups and individually tested. 5s heard on tape a French-Canadian describe a picture and they were required to sketch this while listening. 5s were made fully aware that their speaker had a choice of language for his description. The four groups heard the same male speaker describe the drawing but each in a different guise: (1) French, (2) Mix-mix, (3) Fluent English and (4) Nonfluent English. 5s were then requested to rate their speaker and his performance, and to record a description of another picture themselves for that same French-Canadian to draw later. From analyses of the ratings and the 5s' tapes, the hypotheses were confirmed and different types of accommodation noted. A theoretical framework for these results and other forms of interpersonal accommodation was suggested. (Bilingualism; social interaction; accommodation theory; Canadian French, Canadian English.) Much research has accrued recently which demonstrates that an individual's speech patterns are in part dependent on the person to whom he is talking, the topic of the discourse and the setting in which it takes place (reviewed by Giles &[1] The present investigation was supported by a grant from the Canada Council. The authors wish to express their gratitude to Marc Leroux for his excellent voice recordings and to Professor Dell Hymes for his extremely useful comments on an earlier version of this paper. An abridged version of this paper was delivered at the Annual Conference of the British Psychological Society in April 1972, at Nottingham. [2] Howard Giles and Richard Bourhis are now at University College, Cardiff, South Wales, U.K.

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Powesland, in preparation). The bilingual's and bidialectal's choice of language and dialect respectively have been shown to be a function of these three factors (e.g. Herman 1961; Rubin 1962; Blom & Gumperz 1972) as has the monolingual's choice of speech style (e.g. Brown & Gilman i960; Labov 1966; Giles 1973). Indeed, 'Fishman, Hymes and Gumperz also stress the further point that both bilingualism and diglossia are best not considered in isolation, but rather as salient examples of a capacity for code variations which is also found among monolinguals' (MacNamara 1967). It is, according to Hymes (1972), this notion of code variation and speech diversity that has been singled out as the hallmark of sociolinguistics. The models of speech dynamics that have emerged in sociolinguistics (ErvinTripp 1964; Hymes 1967) have relied on a descriptive approach in terms of presenting a taxonomy of factors influencing code variations, such as topic, setting and so forth. This initial work has been extremely important since 'the work of taxonomy is a necessary part of progress towards models (structural and generative) of sociolinguistic description, formulation of universal sets of features and relations, and explanatory theories' (Hymes 1972). However, since our taxonomies have changed little over the past few years, the present writers have felt the need to develop a tentative, explanatory sociolinguistic theory to account for at least certain specific types of speech diversities. The strategy at this initial stage was to formulate a theory which focused on one taxonomic level, in this case, the interpersonal aspects of speech diversity. Most of the research at the interpersonal level in multi- and bi-lingual societies has been concerned with suggesting that social norms are operative in the choice of a language or code depending on the characteristics of the participants such as sex and status (e.g. Herman 1961; Sechrest, Flores & Arellano 1968; Kimple, Cooper & Fishman 1969). Certain studies of monolinguistic code variation can also be understood within a framework of normative behavior. For instance, it has been shown that a speaker makes linguistic adjustments depending on such perceived characteristics of the listener as social status (Slobin, Miller & Porter 1968), sex (Benney, Reisman & Star 1956), age (Granowsky & Krossner 1970) and presumed knowledge about the conversational topic (Ratner & Rice 1963). Therefore, certain shifts in speech style can be the result of complying with social norms. In other words, it is expected that we should speak in a particular manner to a certain type of person. However, a great deal of work on monolingual speech diversity at the interpersonal level has been more concerned with demonstrating that often speakers adapt or accommodate their speech towards that of their interlocutors when social norms in all probability are not operative. Such accommodative behavior has been termed 'response matching' by Argyle (1969) and may be a subtler, and perhaps more unconscious speech shift than those hitherto mentioned. This phenomenon has been demonstrated in a number of studies on at least one member 178

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of an interactive dyad where a speaker tends to adopt the speech patterns of the person to whom he is talking. It has been studied on a range of linguistic levels including speech rate (Webb 1970), vocal intensity (Black 1949), regional accent (Giles 1973), speech durations (Matarazzo, Weins, Matarazzo & Saslow 1968) and speech silences (Jaffe & Feldstein 1970). Other studies (Lennard & Bernstein i960; Welkowitz & Feldstein 1970) have shown that speech accommodation between members of a dyad can often be a mutual process increasing each time the participants interact. Unfortunately, however, little work has been conducted into the process whereby members of entirely separate ethnolinguistic groups attempt to accommodate to each other. Giles (1971; 1973) has attempted to formulate a model for accent change in social interaction and has termed such accommodative speech strategies 'convergent' behaviour. But he has pointed to the fact that accommodative speech is unlikely to occur in all interpersonal situations. For instance, Giles hypothesized that if a speaker does not require this interlocutor's social approval and finds the latter somewhat distasteful (maybe because of his personality or attitudes), he may modify his accent in a direction opposed to that of his partner 'divergence'. Little work has been conducted as yet demonstrating the existence empirically of divergent speech patterns either bi- or monolingually (Bourhis, Giles & Lambert 1972). Nevertheless, work on the language and code loyalty of a minority group who retains its code as an expression of group or national identity in the face of the majority culture's language could be regarded as a form of divergent behavior (e.g. Gumperz 1964; Fishman et al. 1966). Thus, one may identify at least three forms of speech modifications in interpersonal situations; namely normative, accommodative and divergent code variations. But it is clear that even this may be too broad an area to initiate model-building at this stage, and so our emphasis will be on only one form of interpersonal code shift - accommodation. The aims of this paper then are twofold. First, we shall attempt to provide a theory for interpersonal accommodation in speech hoping that, like the previous taxonomies, it may be flexible enough to cope with both mono- and bilingual accommodation. Secondly, as part of ongoing research into the theory, another aim of the paper was to test it in one very specific bicultural setting with its own peculiar history - Quebec, Canada, The essence of the theory lies in the social psychological research on similarityattraction (see review of Simons, Berkowitz & Meyer 1970). This work suggests that an individual can induce another to evaluate him more favorably by reducing certain dissimilarities between them. The process of speech accommodation of course operates on this principle and as such may be a reflection of an individual's desire for social approval. In exchange theory terms (Homans 1961), it seems likely that the accommodative act may involve certain costs for the speaker, that is in terms of identity change and expended effort, and so such behavior may only 179

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be initiated if potential rewards are available. Thus, if one can accept the notion that people find social approval from others rewarding, it would not seem unreasonable to suppose that there may be a general set to accommodate to others in most social situations. This, set is of course not insensitive to the demands of the specific occasion as can be inferred from the reference to speech divergence earlier. Moreover, it can be proposed that the amount of accommodation a person exhibits may in part be a function of the strength of his need for social approval from the other. Many other factors could affect the intensity of this need including the probability of future interactions, the extent of the accommodatee's social power and the perception of prior accommodation from that person. Nevertheless, not all examples of response matching (or convergence) can be understood within this accommodation framework and hence it seems important to consider a distinction made by Giles (1971) between 'positive' and 'negative' response matching. The studies cited so far have all been examples of the former and may be explainable in terms of the model proposed. Negative response matching on the other hand, was the term introduced to denote certain types of modelling which appear more plausibly explainable within a fabric of social retaliation. Such behaviour may be exemplified in situations where one person reciprocates the other's use of interruptions (Argyle & Kendon 1967) and verbal aggression (Mosher, Mortimer & Grebel 1968). As previously stated, little work has been conducted into the process whereby members of entirely separate ethnolinguistic groups attempt to accommodate to each other. What then are the likely speech modifications or adjustments (if any) that a person from one language background will make when interacting with a representative from another linguistic milieu? Is it likely that bilinguals from one ethnic group will use both languages when interacting with bilinguals of another ethnolinguistic group? Or alternatively, must accommodation with regard to bilingual behavior be an all-or-none process? If the latter were to be the case, is it possible that an English-Canadian (EC) bilingual who had just been provided with information in English by a French-Canadian (FC) bilingual would accommodate back to that person by replying in his second language (French)? The present empirical study was designed in an attempt to answer these questions in the context of a bicultural setting, Quebec, and also to test certain assumptions of the general accommodation model suggested above. These assumptions relate to the listener's evaluations of the accommodator and also to a greater desire to accommodate to those who have previously shown willingness to accommodate to oneself. It must be stressed that the authors are fully aware of the fact that the study can in no way be thought of as a valid test in itself of the theory. Rather, the study is conceived of as an attempt to establish preliminary support for hypotheses derived from the theory in one of many possible cultural contexts available. The following hypotheses were proposed: 180

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I. The greater the amount of effort in accommodation that a FC bilingual is perceived to put into his message, the more favorably he will be perceived by EC bilingual listeners. II. When accommodation by a FC speaker is perceived by EC listeners, the latter will respond in an accommodating manner. III. The greater the amount of effort that a FC speaker is perceived to put into accommodating towards an EC bilingual listener, the more effort he in turn will put into accommodating back to him.METHOD

Subjects

The Ss for this experiment consisted of 80 ECs (43 female and 37 male) who claimed to possess at least a 'working knowledge' of French. Ss were students at McGill University, Montreal, and volunteered for the study thinking it was concerned with the effectiveness of communication between French- and EnglishCanadians. Their self-evaluation scores for their own French skills (using 9-point rating scales where 1 indicated native usage) were 4.21 for comprehension and 4.95 for speaking fluency. 5s were randomly assigned to one of four experimental conditions while at the same time equating the subgroups for sex. There were no significant differences (one-way analyses of variances) between the four groups in their self-rated French skills. Materials The materials for this experiment included two scenic pictures, paper and pencil, tape-recorded descriptions, tape-recording equipment and series of rating scales. Tape recordings. A 380-word English description of a very simple harbour scene was composed in such a manner that another person could draw it while listening to the description; verbal repetitions of the objects in the picture and their positions were abundant. A male FC bilingual student tape-recorded four versions of this passage. (1) Totally in French (duration 2 mins 47 sec). (2) Mixed French and English (duration 2 mins 56 sec). To make this mixture sound realistic, the body of the passage was spoken in French whilst the repetitions were in English; English accounted for about 1/3 of the passage length. (3) Fluent English (duration 3 mins 12 sees). The description was spoken in fluent, grammatically-perfect English but with a distinct FC accent. (4) Non-fluent English (duration 5 mins 10 sees). This passage was produced by the speaker as though he was not really fluent in English and it contained many filled and unfilled pauses, speech disturbances and a few grammatical errors (e.g. misuse of tense markers). Nevertheless, the description was fully comprehensible. It was thought that descriptions (i)-(4) would be considered by EC bilinguals as reflecting a series of messages increasing with regard to their effort in perceived accommodation. Each of these four versions was preceded on the tapes by exactly the same 40181

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second recording. In this extract, the 5 apparently hears the FC speaker at PUniversite de Montreal (a French-speaking institution) being given his instruction for describing the picture by the experimenter. The substance of this predescription recording was as follows. The speaker could be heard being told (in French) that his recipient would be an EC bilingual. The FC was then heard to enquire of the experimenter which language he should use for his audience. The experimenter asked (in English) whether he could speak English - the reply was affirmative (also in English) - and then told him he could speak in the language of his choice. The purpose of this procedure was to ensure that EC listeners were made fully aware of certain features of the situation even though these were made explicit and stressed in the listening instructions. These features were (a) that the 5s' speaker was known to be a FC bilingual, (b) that 5s were aware of the fact that their speaker knew that they themselves were bilingual, and (c) that 5s were aware that their speaker's language form on tape was the result of a conscious choice on the part of the FC. Rating scales. There were three separate sets of scales used in the study, all of which consisted of nine rating points. Four pre-instruction scales were administered to 5s on arrival in the testing situation. These were concerned with 5s' reported skills in speaking and understanding both French and English. Seventeen post-drawing scales were used and these were concerned with the Ss' assessments of the FC speaker and his descriptive performance. They related to (a) the quality of the speaker's description, (b) ease in reproducing the picture, (c) task enjoyment, (d) likelihood that the speaker would be a friend, (e) desire to have the same speaker as a future experimental partner, (f) speaker's attachment to FC values, (g) speaker's effort in bridging the cultural gap between FCs and ECs. From the data of a study by Aboud and Taylor (1971), three scales strongly stereotypical each of FCs (colourful, emotional and talkative) and ECs (logical, stable and egotistic) were used such that 5s were required to rate to what extent these traits represented their particular speaker. In addition, 5s were required to rate how likeable, friendly, considerate and narrow-minded they considered their speaker to be. 5s were also given an opportunity of providing any further comments they might care to make. Finally, 5s were required on seven post-speaking scales to rate how they felt in the role of the speaker. They were asked to rate how much they enjoyed giving their description and to what extent they had felt unsociable, relaxed, uncomfortable, happy, active, weak and unfriendly when recording their description. In addition, 5s were asked to state which languages they had used and why they had chosen them. Again, 5s were asked if they would like to make any further comments. 182

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Procedure

The testing procedure lasted about 25 minutes per 5 and was conducted in English by a FC experimenter. All 5s were thus individually-tested and before they were read the standard instructions, they were required to rate their ability in French and English on sheets provided. 5s were told that it had been hoped that a face-to-face situation could have been created but because of the enormous difficulties involved in transporting FCs to McGill University and EC students to l'Universitd de Montreal at convenient times for all, taped messages were being used. They were told that bilingual FC students had been recorded at PUniversite de Montreal in which they had been describing a picture for bilingual EC students. 5s were told that they would each hear one of these FC bilinguals, and from his taped description were expected to draw the picture he was talking about. Later, they were informed, they would be given the opportunity of recording a description for that same FC to draw. 5s were assured that the quality of their drawing was completely unimportant as we just wanted to see if the message had been effectively communicated. 5s were then provided with paper and pencil and told to draw the picture as the speaker was describing it. The experimenter turned on the tape recorder when 5s were ready, but apparently did so a little too far back on the tape (and apologized) as the FC speaker was heard receiving his instructions in French. During this 'mistake', 5s heard the FC speak English and be given the opportunity of choosing the language in which to describe the picture for an EC bilingual. Members of any one subject group heard the same description by the same male FC stooge but in one of the four different guises mentioned above. After drawing the picture from the F C s description, 5s were presented with a questionnaire on which they were required to rate their reactions to their speaker and his performance. The 5s were then presented with a similar picture to the one they had just drawn and asked to describe this one for the same FC bilingual whom they were told would draw it the following week; 5s were handed a microphone and were then tape-recorded giving their description. This completed, 5s were asked to fill in another short questionnaire on which they were required to give reasons for choosing the language(s) they had, and also to rate how they felt giving their message.RESULTS

In order to determine whether perceived effort in accommodation by the FC speaker affected listeners' evaluations of him and how they felt talking to him, one-way analyses of variance were computed from the questionnaire data. Very few of the 5s' ratings yielded significant trends, but those that did can be found in Table 1. It can be seen from the mean ratings that a speaker's perceived considerateness and effort in bridging the cultural gap are a function of his perceived effort in accommodation. Table 1 also shows that 5s consider the mixed 183

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French and English situation to be the most difficult decoding and encoding condition. As expected, 5s in the four conditions did not differ in their selfrated English language skills, nor as reported earlier, in their French skills. Fourteen different categories of speech accommodation were identified from the ECs' tape-recorded messages and these appear together with their frequencies of occurrence under the four conditions in Table 2. From this table, it can be seen that various amounts of speaking the two languages did in fact occurTABLE 1. Mean ratings of Ss and their F values on four scales Rating scales I N = 80 Stimulus conditions MixFluent French English mix(n = 20) (n = 20) (n = 20)

Nonfluent English(n = 20)

F values (df = 3, 76)

Ease in reproducing drawing Effort in bridging culturalgap made by FC speaker FCs' considerateness

5-93 1.30 1.67 2.16

6.20 1.70

2.852.15 2.00

4.33.65 2.90

13.04** 9.71** 3-22* 4.23*

ECs' relaxation when giving description to FC

i-95 3.65

1.80

3.65

The higher the mean ratings the more ease, effort, considerateness and relaxation was felt by 5s. **p