The Impact of Dutch-accented English and Whether a Prejudice Control Works in a Job Interview

Abstract

Globalization in the whole world has led to the need of using English as a lingua franca, and thus the number of non-native speakers of English has increased. International companies now can recruit international talents all over the world, however, non-native accentedness remains a factor of discrimination. To investigate more on the non-native listeners’ evaluation of speaker hirability, especially when the listeners have a similar language background with the non-native accented speaker, this study aimed to first examine how Dutch listeners would evaluate Dutch-accented speaker and native AmE-accented speaker on their intelligence, comprehensibility, affect (likeability, status, competence) and hirability. The second aim was to test if prejudice control might lessen the degree of accentedness discrimination. Findings showed that Dutch listeners favored the American-accented speaker over the Dutch-accented speaker in the recruiting process. Moreover, interference of prejudice control seemed not to make a difference. An additional finding was that work experience does not seem to reduce Dutch listeners’ accentedness bias towards the Dutch-accented speaker.