Do People Sound More Mature Depending on Their Native Language?

This kind of goes hand-in-hand with my Puberty Discussion Thread thread, and I'm going to tag @Ienzo since she's an expert in this field.

Here's an example what I believe is a German let's player speaking:

If I had to make a guess based off appearance, I'd say the guy looks anywhere between 16 and 18 years of age.

 

The let's player in that video is 19 and is speaking French.

For me personally, I don't hear any discernible difference in "maturity" when listening to people switch languages on the fly. Even if their accents change, their tone sounds the same.

I think any added "maturity" someone thinks they might hear from a language itself would have to come from connotations that person has with that language.

 

Do you know the guy?

 

You can find information links from his YouTube channel. I don't understand French or anything, but can discern from German and French.

 

I think the accent will hold different connotations depending on how each person thinks about the accent's origin. e.g. Assuming all Biritish people are posh and pompous so whenever you hear the accent you associate that person with being arrogant. There is also the idea that we don't understand the language someone speaks and therefore are just a little amazed at the words coming out of their mouth perhaps making us think they are really mature (i.e. "I had terrible problems learning French in French lessons but this person speaks it! Wow, they must know so much!").

So I don't think there is any true basis to the idea but if you think someone does sound more mature when they talk due to their accent, it will most likely be us putting our biases onto that person.

 

Yup, he' s French. And I don' t know how mature the guy is (pompous=/=mature), but his speech is rather elaborate. As in journalistic.

 

I think it really depends, because people are born from every vocal range all over the world, and one person who can speak multiple languages may find one tone of voice more comfortable in one language and another in the other. Though I think studying multilingual people may be the best way to find out for sure, I doubt the results would show a trend.

 

Im guuessing usually i try not to assume.

 

Considering I can pass off on several accents I can assure it doesn't make you sound any more mature. I really have no idea what that guy is saying in the video, though I also can discern between French and German (-_- Amaury ....), in my mind he's just speaking gibberish and that doesn't scream maturity. Though that's just the way I feel and I can't really have any way of judging his character or his maturity without talking to the guy.

When I think of someone thinking someone is more mature or even intelligent ... I can't help but think of one of my neighbors talking to the Doctor ... we all know how mature he is.

-Nights