Human language is considered unique among all forms of animal communication. Language is intrinsically linked to our emotions, social connections, and many other elements of cognition. Each individual can learn a language that can begin from the infancy stage.
Another remarkable thing about humans is our ability to learn a foreign language, which can take months or years. Most people wish to speak another language fluently without going through all the trouble of learning it. There is a case, however, where a person suddenly speaks with the accent of someone from a different country or region.
Lost in Another Language
An American man in his 50s developed an Irish accent after his treatment for metastatic prostate cancer despite not having been to Ireland. He could not stop talking with an Irish brogue and continued speaking this way until his death. He was later diagnosed with foreign accent syndrome (FAS), a speech disorder that causes a sudden change in speech when a native speaker is perceived to speak with a "foreign" accent.
Foreign accent syndrome is not an accent change despite its name. While it sounds strange for a person to learn a language suddenly, FAS is a legitimate medical condition that is often treatable and may even be reversible.
In this condition, speech may be altered regarding intonation, timing, and tongue placement, making it sound foreign. FAS is also associated with speech changes such as voicing errors, unusual prosody, consonant substitution, and vowel distortions. Nevertheless, speech remains highly intelligible and does not necessarily sound disordered.
Causes of Foreign Accent Syndrome
FAS has been documented in cases around the world. To date, around 200 cases of foreign accent syndrome have been reported in clinical studies. FAS was first described in 1901 by French neurologist Pierre Marie when he studied the case of a man who originally spoke French with a Parisian accent. After this man suffered from a stroke, he began speaking with a regional French accent from Strasbourg.
FAS is usually caused by damage to the brain brought on by a stroke or traumatic brain injury. Other causes include multiple sclerosis and conversion disorder.
Aside from the damage to the central nervous system, foreign accent syndrome can also be due to psychological factors like extreme stress. In 2005, experts were informed about the case of a native Dutch speaker who had a heavy French accent due to intense stress after being almost hit by a car. Detailed neurological studies showed no brain anomalies, but psychological investigations identified important issues.
A similar case was observed in a 50-year-old woman who went to the emergency room after she suddenly began speaking with a Canadian accent, even though she is a native Italian speaker. Brain scans showed no signs of brain injury, and her neurological activity patterns appeared typical of a healthy, bilingual adult. Before she was admitted to the hospital, the woman had tested positive for COVID-19, which is known to be tied to brain problems. Experts assume that SARS-CoV-2 infection played a role in the development of foreign accent syndrome in this patient.
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