A brief moment in time.

[Tathkar Eisgrim]

I was at work yesterday. I work in a customer services role. I answered the telephone to find myself speaking with with a customer, a complete stranger - who happened to be a Scotswoman.

During our conversation, she substituted the word 'aye' for 'yes'. In reply, I substituted 'aye' for 'yes'. I am not a Scotsman.

For the briefest of moments, I think I slipped into my character mindset...

[Rystefn]

Yeah... this is the part where I pretend I've never typed entire e-mails in Layla. >.>

[Anime Sword Fighter]

Nah. Well, maybe.
But there's a thing where you will subconsciously mimic someone's accent when you are speaking to them, if only slightly. Probably from playing your dwarf made it more pronounced with outright saying 'aye' rather than just copying the accent itself.

[ArcanaFTW]

When I play a character I have a tendency to pretend I am him in general conversation, or just when I'm alone. It gets rather awkward when my friends hear me yelling. 'Blast this infernal contraption, fireballs onto you!' towards the Microwave.

[Yma23]

But there's a thing where you will subconsciously mimic someone's accent when you are speaking to them, if only slightly. Probably from playing your dwarf made it more pronounced with outright saying 'aye' rather than just copying the accent itself.

Oh boy *puts linguistic hat on*

Ok so I'm a bit rusty at this, and I cannot remember the term, but language works, at least partly, as a manner to make community bonds and groups. When you speak to someone, and you like them/are trying to get them to like you, you're more likely to shift your own language use closer to theirs. I think it's called 'Distancing' though I could be wrong.

For example, a british person dumped in a scottish town may, after a while, start to pick up scottish slang, an deven dialect to an extent. Certain words that one group (or even one person) uses a lot, may be picked up too. (This is an interesting one. I used 'To be fair...' a lot in my own speach. It's just how I work. Since I started living with him, I've noticed my fiance also uses that phrase a lot more too. You can actually see these things working!'

Basically, everyone has their own manners of speach. If we like this person, or want to have this person like us, we assimilate these methods of speach into our own in an attempt to assist that. If we don't like this person, we will probably distance ourselves a bit more in our manner of speach. Especialy if the differences are quite subtle.

This all falls down to an extent when the difference is as huge as a very strong accent, or a different language, wihch is difficult to assimialte entirely, and which is noticable. (though it does happen, but when it does it's on a concious level, not subconcious) But for minor word usages and such, it generally proves true.

In the above example, 'Aye' is a phrase we all know means 'yes'. Tathkar is used to using it IG, and when he heard the scottish person on the phone using it, it just became easy for him to subconciously start using it, in order to appear more friendly and approachable.

Hope i've explained myself alright here.