Sociophonetic variation in speech perception

Abstract

In this paper, I review previous research that investigates sociophonetic variation in speech perception. I also argue that more speech perception work is needed to inform work on variation in speech production, particularly in the areas of language change and stereotype formation. Exploring the mental representations and processing of social and linguistic information as well as treating phonetic and social factors as multidimensional and interacting will take future work in sociophonetics in new and exciting directions. © 2010 The Author. Journal Compilation © 2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd.