Critical Period effects in SLL: the influence of maturational stage on the

acquisition of English as a SL- Johnson and Newport

Lenneberg lge could be acquired only within a critical period, from infancy to puberty
in order for lge to develop fully. Tests showed that a critical period for lge. Acquisition
extends its effects to SLA.
Evidence for a critical period effect in First LA:

Lenneberg reviewed available behavioral evidence suggesting that normal language

learning occurred primarily or exclusively within childhood. & He proposed a
neurological mechanism which might be responsible for a maturational change in
learning abilities: the brain, having reached its adult values at puberty, has lost the
plasticity and reorganization capacities necessary for acquiring lge.

The case of genie she was deprived of lge and social interaction until the age of 13.
Her lack of linguistic competence, after 7 years of rehabilitation, supports the critical
period hypothesis. But this has been questioned due to the abnormal conditions in
which Genie was reared (nutritional, cognitive and social deprivation.
Deaf population (Newport & Suppala) (American sign language is their first language)
 exposure to first lge may occur at varying ages because 90% have hearing parents
so only a few individuals are exposed to sign lge at birth. They are first exposed when
they enter schools for the deaf. Other aspects of social and cognitive development
remain normal. The results show a linear decline in performance with increasing age of
exposure, on virtually every morpheme tested. That is, native learners (exposed from
birth) scored better than early learners (exposed from 4-6), who scored better than late
learners (exposed from 12), on both production and comprehension.

Lennebergpartially incorrect  1) continuous linear decline in ability, instead of a

sudden drop-off puberty as his hypothesis implies. 2) while postpubescent learners did
not reach as high a level of proficiency as the native or early learners, language had
not become totally unlearnable for them.
Second Language Acquisition
Some investigators have suggested that a critical period theory must predict that
children are better than adults at learning second languages, as well as first languages.
J&N  Not necessarily. A CP theory for language acquisition would have quite a
different character depending upon whether SLA were included in its effects.
1. The Exercise hypothesis: Early in life, humans have a superior capacity for
acquiring languages. If the capacity is not exercised during this time, it will
disappear or decline with maturation. If the capacity is exercises, however,
further language abilities will remain intact throughout life.
2. The Maturational State hypothesis: Early in life, humans have a superior
capacity for acquiring languages. This capacity disappears or declines with
maturation.

Both = about First LA  about SLA

 1. Learning should be = in children & adults,
perhaps a bit superior in adults (greater
skills in their first lang.
2. Children will be better in SLL as well as
first because of the maturational state of
the child’s brain which children particularly
good at acquiring any lang.
(Early) Research on Age Effects on SLA

 Adults appear to have an advantage on children in phonology and syntax if the

study analyzes the early stages of learning.

 For studies of ultimate attainment, children have an advantage for acquiring

phonology over adults (who carry an accent). As for the ultimate attainment of
grammar, studies (conducted on immigrants who were exposed to English upon
moving to the U.S.) showed that age of arrival was the only significant prediction of test
performance. Attitudinal variables such as motivation, self-consciousness and
identification with the country did not predict language performance.
J&N research
Subjects: 46 native Chinese or Korean speakers who learned English as a SL. They
were all college student or professors 0who had lived in the U.S for at least 5 years.
The group was divide between early arrivals (before age 15) and later arrivals (after
age 15).
Procedure: The subjects were tested on their knowledge of English syntax and by
being asked to judge the grammaticality of spoken English sentences of varying type.
They were also interviewed about their language background.
Materials: grammatical and ungrammatical sentences constructed to test 12 types of
rules in English (Past tense, plural, third person singular, present progressive,
determiners, PR nominalization, particle movement, subcategorization, auxiliaries,
yes/no questions, wh-questions, word order).
Results:

 Strong relationship between year of arrival to the U.S. an and performance.

 If immersed in a second language before the age of 7, one is able to achieve
native fluency in the lge; however, immersion even soon after that age result in
a decrement in ultimate performance.
 There is a consistent decline in performance over age for those exposed to the
language before puberty, but no systematic relationship of age of exposure, and
a leveling off of ultimate performance, among those expose to the lge after
puberty.
 Before age 15 there are very few individual differences in the ultimate ability to
learn language within any particular age group, success in learning is almost
entirely predicted by the age at which it begins. But for adults, later age of
acquisition determines that one will not become native or near native in a
language, however, there are large individual variations in ultimate ability in the
language, within the lowered range of performance.
 Age of arrival in the U.S. appears to be the better measure of age of acquisition
than age of exposure to formal instruction.
In addition to years of exposure to English, other variables were considered such
classroom experience and attitude. None of these variables correlated significantly with
performance. They did find added predictive value with two attitudinal variables: self-
consciousness and American identification. Each of the two makes a significant
contribution to a regression model including age of arrival and other attitudinal
variables.