What is it about?
After someone experiences a concussion (also known as mild traumatic brain injury; mTBI), they may have deficits in attention, auditory processing, and working memory. All of these skills are needed for perceiving nonnative-accented speech. This study examines whether people who have suffered an concussion find nonnative-accented speech less intelligible and whether they report experiencing more cognitive symptoms than controls when perceiving nonnative-accented speech.
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Why is it important?
Our findings help support a bigger picture that everyday skills (such as understanding a speaker with a nonnative accent) can be harder for people who have had a concussion, even years after they’ve “recovered" from their injury. This may negatively impact an individual's quality of life, and should be taken into consideration when providing interventions to patients who have had a concussion.
Perspectives
Concussions are common and many people report feeling different after their injury, despite being "cleared" by a doctor. This study provides insight into the long-lasting impacts of concussion and how everyday skills may be more challenging for people who have had a brain injury.
Arden Ricciardone
University of Connecticut
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Accented Speech Perception in Noise After Mild Traumatic Brain Injury, Journal of Speech Language and Hearing Research, October 2025, American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA),
DOI: 10.1044/2025_jslhr-24-00879.
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