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In America, prestige speaks with a British accent. Friendliness, however, sounds a lot like you. 在美国，人们觉得英音高大上，而美音则显得友善。 Record a variety of people reading the same passage aloud —speakers from different regions of the English-speaking world—and then play those recordings to American college students. Ask the students for their first impressions about the speakers. Are they well-educated? Do they have good jobs? Are they funny? Would you trust them? 让来自不同英语地区的人们大声朗读同一段文章后，把录音播放给美国大学生听，并询问学生们对这些说话人的第一印象：他们是否受了良好的教育？他们是否有好的工作？他们幽默吗？你能信任他们吗？ Historically, with a big enough sample (say, a few hundred people), you would have found two things. First, that the speakers of British English, particularly the upper-class dialect known as Received Pronunciation (RP, or “the Queen’s English”), would rate highest on measures of social status and power, such as wealth, education level, and assertiveness. Second, speakers with American accents (particularly the same American accent as the raters had) would score highest on measures of solidarity, such as friendliness and sense of humor. 以往，样本足够多时（比如说有几百人参与研究），你会发现两件事。首先，说英式英语的人，尤其是被称为标准发音的上流社会口音（RP，或者叫“女王英语”）在衡量社会地位和权利时得到的评价最高，包括财富、教育程度和自信等。其次，美式发音的人（尤其是和评价者有着同样的美式口音的人）会在测评团结程度时得分最高，比如说友善程度和幽默感。 | 
