use Devel::Peek; my $value = "four"; my @array = ( "one" ); warn "(1):\n" ; Dump($value); foreach $value (@array) { warn "(2):\n" ; Dump($value); print "foreach value: $value\t"; function(); sub function { warn "(3):\n" ; Dump($value); print "function value: $value\n"; } } __END__ (1): SV = PV(0x8b83b00) at 0x8b83768 REFCNT = 1 FLAGS = (PADBUSY,PADMY,POK,pPOK) PV = 0x8b992c8 "four"\0 CUR = 4 LEN = 8 (2): SV = PV(0x8b83c20) at 0x8b82c28 REFCNT = 2 FLAGS = (POK,pPOK) PV = 0x8b962c0 "one"\0 CUR = 3 LEN = 4 (3): SV = NULL(0x0) at 0x8b837b0 REFCNT = 2 FLAGS = (PADBUSY,PADMY) foreach value: one function value: