Differences or fundamental differences?

Abstract

In his paper, Meisel discusses the differences between (bilingual) L1 ((2)L1), child L2 (cL2), and adult L2 (aL2) acquisition. He claims that both types of L2 acquisition are fundamentally different from (monolingual as well as bilingual) L1 acquisition. He argues that these fundamental differences are due to neuronal maturation and that they concern in particular the acquisition of morphosyntax. Meisel presents both neurological and linguistic evidence suggesting that the age of approximately 3;7 till 4 years is critical such that children who acquire a language after the age of acquisition (AoA) of 4 should in general be classified as cL2 learners, whereas children that start learning one (or several) languages before the AoA of 4 are expected to behave like L1 acquirers. More specifically, Meisel postulates that maturational changes in the course of childhood explain why L1 and L2 acquisition proceed in different ways. He reviews neuroimaging studies that show that L2 learners process syntactically deviant sentences differently from native speakers (Weber-Fox & Neville 1999). The results of these studies suggest that L2 learners show a more diffuse spatial distribution of activation patterns as well as increased activation in the right hemisphere. According to Weber-Fox & Neville (1999), the critical age ranges from which on these changes appear lie around the age of four and the age of seven. Meisel takes this as evidence that there are qualitative changes in the acquisition process around these two age ranges. To further pinpoint the areas of grammar where L2 acquisition might be fundamentally different from L1, Meisel considers linguistic evidence