Vocal accommodation in family and peer networks in mid-childhood

International audienceAcoustic variations are found in the vocal communication of many animals, includinghumans. Vocal structures can vary in relation to individual characteristics and groupmembership. Moreover, individuals can modify their vocalizations to match those of theirpartners during vocal exchanges. Although vocal matching has been extensively described byethologists and sociolinguistics in adults, their ontogenetic mechanisms and functions remainunexplored. Therefore, we aimed to study whether and how children adjust their speech todifferent partners within both family and peer groups. In this perspective, an intensive singlecasestudy was conducted on a ten-year-old boy from a French village known for the use of aregional dialect. Dyadic conversations were recorded at home with family members and fourclose friends according to the duration of the relationship and their native origin. Variousvernacular variants of general and regional local French were examined. Our results showedthat the different partners had different uses of both general and regional variants, and that thechild accommodated his speech to the identity of his partner