Dundonians needed for new research project

Dundonians needed for new research project

Dundonians needed for new research project

If you call your slippers ‘baffies’ and go to the baker for a ‘peh’ and not a pie, Abertay University would love to hear from you for a paid research project.

The University’s Division of Psychology & Forensic Sciences is looking for native Dundonian speakers for a psychology research project looking at how the brain processes language.

Those invited to take part will be asked to look at images of various items and asked to assign them a name in Dundonian and in English.

Once the 40-minute online exercise is completed participants will be offered a £15 amazon voucher.

A PC/laptop with microphone is required to take part in the research.

The research is part of a larger body of work funded by the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland looking at Code Switching, which is when a person alternates between two different languages or dialects depending on the context of the conversation they are having.

It follows on from previous research which aimed to find which language was more dominant within the Dundonian population, showing similarities with more traditionally recognised “bilinguals”.

The plan for the current study has been published in the PLOS ONE journal and will be carried out by Abertay University’s Dr Neil Kirk and Dr Mathieu Declerck at Vrije Universiteit Brussel in Belgium.

Dr Neil Kirk, who is leading the study says: “We ah ken Dundonian is the vibrant vernacular that maks oor city so special.

“With this research we hope to find out how our brains are able to switch from one language to another without causing interference with each other.”

Those who would like to take part in the research are asked to send their name and age to mind@abertay.ac.uk with the subject “Dundonian research”.