Dolphins ‘have regional accents’ as whistles influenced by where they live

Nurture trumps nature as scientists find it’s not genetics but location and community that influence speech, Liam James writes

Bottlenosed dolphins speak differently in different parts (Getty)

A dolphin develops an accent based on where it lives, research has found.

Biologists built on earlier studies that found a link between location and how dolphins communicate to determine the aquatic mammals have regional accents in a similar way to humans.

The latest research focuses on the signature whistles that dolphins use to identify each other.