What's the world's friendliest accent and how does SA fare?

A recent joint study by the University of Chicago and the University of Munich found six in 10 people believe others have judged them based on their accents.

It's a bias, they found, that could affect how friendly, attractive and even intelligent a person might be perceived, purely by opening their mouths. 

With this in mind, MinimumDepositCasinos.org decided to delve further into how people's accents (when speaking in English) affect how others see them. After a survey of 5,000 participants, the company said Americans have the highest odds of being judged as friendly based on how they speak, with one in five respondents (or 19.5%) saying they thought the US accent was the friendliest. 

South Africans come in fairly low on the list — in a respectable 12th place overall, but with just one in 100 participants (1.6%) choosing the accent as the friendliest sounding. We note, however, that there was no information on which South African accent they used — or, for that matter, which American accent and so on.

The researchers point out the South African ranking is quite a change from a 2019 poll to find the “world's sexiest accents”, in which the Afrikaner's English accent came in second (New Zealand came first).

This latest listing had the British accent coming in second with one in seven (13.6%) respondents ruling it the most friendly. The researchers say this corresponds with another study that found the British accent to be the most likable globally, with 45% of respondents saying they enjoy hearing their native language spoken with a British accent.

The Australian accent placed third with almost one in 10 considering it friendly (8.8%). The researchers point out that while the Kiwi accent is often regarded as closely resembling the Australian accent, primarily distinguished by vowel pronunciation, New Zealanders ranked 15th overall.

The Canadian accent came fourth (8.7%); German fifth (5.7%) and French sixth (5.5%).

Seventh spot went to the Scottish (3.2%), while Italian and Austrian tied in eighth place with 3%. Ninth was shared by the Spanish and the Irish at 2.8%. Tenth went to India (2.2%).

In understanding why some accents are seen as more friendly than others, Dr Christopher Strelluf, associate professor of linguistics at the University of Warwick, said: “Attitudes towards language varieties usually reflect the ideas we have about people who speak those varieties. If people around the world think American English sounds friendly, it’s good news for Americans — because it means people think of Americans as friendly people.” 

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