The Critical Period Hypothesis Concerning L2 Revisited: A Critical Review of Two Seminal Articles

(Salah A. Alfarwan)

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Abstract

This paper re-examines the Critical Period Hypothesis (CPH) which proposes that human biology, in the form of brain development, dictates the success of language learning. Specifically if children start learning a language before puberty, it is claimed that, due to the way language is represented in the brain in that period, they learn it more naturally and their ultimate success will be greater than if they start learning after that. This notion has created considerable argument in the field of second language acquisition research (SLA) since the 1960s. In what follows, a critical review is undertaken of the traditional arguments for and against the CPH in the literature in this field, culminating in an in depth analysis of the arguments in two key articles: A critical period for learning to pronounce foreign languages? by J. Flege, and Age and accent in a second language: A reply to James Emil Flege by M. Patkowski. The conclusion is that, as much today as when these articles were written, two issues hinder researchers arriving at a clear confirmation or disconfirmation of the truth of the CPH: problems of definition of the critical period and what exact aspects of language learning it is supposed to affect, and problems of confounding variables that cannot be controlled in empirical studies attempting to test it. Although the CPH itself has limited implications for many practical issues in teaching English as a foreign language, nevertheless it is argued that the exploration of the controversy yields many useful suggestions for teachers, six of which are elaborated. Key Words: Accent, Age, Critical Period Hypothesis, Second language acquisition.
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