Language attrition

Language attrition is the process of losing a native, or first, language. This process is generally caused by both isolation from speakers of the first language ('L1') and the acquisition and use of a second language ('L2'), which interferes with the correct production and comprehension of the first. Such interference from a second language is likely experienced to some extent by all bilinguals, but is most evident among speakers for whom a language other than their first has started to play an important, if not dominant, role in everyday life; these speakers are more likely to experience language attrition. It is common among immigrants that travel to countries where languages foreign to them are used. Language attrition is the process of losing a native, or first, language. This process is generally caused by both isolation from speakers of the first language ('L1') and the acquisition and use of a second language ('L2'), which interferes with the correct production and comprehension of the first. Such interference from a second language is likely experienced to some extent by all bilinguals, but is most evident among speakers for whom a language other than their first has started to play an important, if not dominant, role in everyday life; these speakers are more likely to experience language attrition. It is common among immigrants that travel to countries where languages foreign to them are used. There are several factors which affect the process. Frequent exposure and use of a particular language is often assumed adequate to maintain the native language system intact. However, research has often failed to confirm this prediction. A positive attitude towards the potentially attriting language or its speech community and motivation to retain the language are other factors which may reduce attrition. These factors are too difficult to confirm by research. However, a person's age can well predict the likelihood of attrition; children are demonstrably more likely to lose their first language than adults. These factors are similar to those that affect second language acquisition, and the two processes are sometimes compared. However, the overall impact of these factors is far less than that for second language acquisition. Language attrition results in a decrease of language proficiency. The current consensus is that it manifests itself first and most noticeably in speakers' vocabulary (in their lexical access and their mental lexicon), while grammatical and especially phonological representations appear more stable among speakers who emigrated after puberty. The term first language attrition (FLA) refers to the gradual decline in native language proficiency. As speakers use their L2 frequently and become proficient (or even dominant) in it, some aspects of the L1 can deteriorate or become subject to L2 influence. The study of language attrition became a subfield of linguistics with a 1980 conference at the University of Pennsylvania called 'Loss of Language Skills'. The aim of the conference was to discuss areas of second language attrition and to discuss ideas for possible future research. The conference revealed that attrition is a wide topic, with numerous factors and taking many forms. Decades later, the field of first language attrition gained new momentum with two conferences held in Amsterdam in 2002 and 2005, as well as a series of graduate workshops and panels at international conferences, such as the International Symposium on Bilingualism (2007, 2009), the annual conferences of the European Second Language Association, and the AILA World Congress (2008). The outcomes of some of these meetings were later published in edited volumes. To study the process of language attrition, researchers initially looked at neighboring areas of linguistics to identify which parts of the L1 system attrite first; lacking years of direct experimental data, linguists studied language contact, creolization, L2 acquisition, and aphasia, and applied their findings to language acquisition. One issue that is faced when researching attrition is distinguishing between normal L2 influence on the L1 and actual attrition of the L1. Since all bilinguals experience some degree of cross linguistic influence, where the L2 interferes with the retrieval of the speaker's L1, it is difficult to determine if delays and/or mistakes in the L1 are due to attrition or caused by CLI. Also, simultaneous bilinguals may not have a language that is indistinguishable from that of a native speaker or a language where their knowledge of it is less extensive than a native speaker's; therefore testing for attrition is difficult. The first linguistic system to be affected by first language attrition is the lexicon. The lexical-semantic relationship usually starts to deteriorate first and most quickly, driven by Cross Linguistic Interference (CLI) from the speaker's L2, and it is believed to be exacerbated by continued exposure to, and frequent use of, the L2. Evidence for such interlanguage effects can be seen in a study by Pavlenko (2003, 2004) which shows that there was some semantic extension from the L2, which was English, into the L1 Russian speakers' lexicons. In order to test for lexical attrition, researchers used tests such as picture naming tasks, where they place a picture of an item in front of the participant and ask them to name it, or by measuring lexical diversity in the speaker's spontaneous speech (speech that is unprompted and improvised). In both cases, attriters performed worse than non-attriters. One hypothesis suggests that when a speaker tries to access a lexical item from their L1 they are also competing with the translation equivalents of their L2 and that there is either a problem with activating the L1 due to infrequent use or with the inhibition of the competing L2.