Critical Period Effects in Second Language Learning: The Influence of Maturational State on the Acquisition Of English as a Second Language
Summary of the article
Learning of second language depends on the age of an individual. Lenneberg asserted that an individual could only learn language at the critical periods. Lenneberg found that first language acquisition always occurs at the beginning of puberty for full development of the language. The critical periods extend from the early infancy to puberty. Since the critical period affects the learning of the first language, it is crucial to understand the extent of the critical period and its effect on learning the second language. The test for the hypothesized extent of the critical period can only be successful when testing it with the learning of the second language. Understanding the effect of the critical period involves two versions, exercise hypothesis and maturational state hypothesis with both stating that human acquires first language and second language at a superior capacity while diminishing with maturation.
The understanding of the critical period ultimately leads to the study of whether there is an age-related effect on learning of the second language. The experiments done shows that there existed a strong relationship between the age at which an individual was to learn a second language and the subsequent performance on the second language. The individuals of an earlier age achieve more scores compared to those who started learning at a later age. This implies that the individual will have to get more orientation to the second language in order to learn it faster, as shown in the experiment carried on the acquisition age and ultimate performance. The results from this experiment lead to the question of whether the performance will decline as a subject of the age of exposure or it will flatten at a certain point.
