A critical period for second language acquisition: Evidence from 2/3 million English speakers.

ABSTRACT: Children learn language more easily than adults, though when and why this ability declines have been obscure for both empirical reasons (underpowered studies) and conceptual reasons (measuring the ultimate attainment of learners who started at different ages cannot by itself reveal changes in underlying learning ability). We address both limitations with a dataset of unprecedented size (669,498 native and non-native English speakers) and a computational model that estimates the trajectory of underlying learning ability by disentangling current age, age at first exposure, and years of experience. This allows us to provide the first direct estimate of how grammar-learning ability changes with age, finding that it is preserved almost to the crux of adulthood (17.4 years old) and then declines

SUBMITTER: Hartshorne JK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6559801 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature