Attrition and the Competition Model - Brian MacWhinney, Carnegie Mellon University
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Attrition and the Competition Model
Brian MacWhinney, Carnegie Mellon University
This chapter explores ways in which the Competition Model can illuminate our
understanding of language attrition. We will begin by formulating some of the key puzzles
that arise from empirical studies of language attrition. After this initial problem description,
we will consider how the cognitive and social processes included in the Competition Model
can help in the formulation of solutions to these various puzzles.
Four Puzzles
Puzzle #1: Permastore
It is easy to imagine that language attrition arises simply from disuse of a speaker ‘s first
language (L1). The idea is that, for any given ability, you must “use it or lose it” (Pinker 1994).
Experimental Psychology has provided abundant evidence indicating that unused memory
traces fade over time (Ebbinghaus 1885). In some accounts, forgetting arises through the
weakening of a memory trace by changes at the level of the synapse. In other accounts,
forgetting arises through interference of old memories with new memories. In either
scenario, failure to repeatedly access and use the old memory is viewed as the cause of
forgetting and problems with retrieval (Paradis 1993). Problems of this type also arise in
people suffering from dementia or anomia.
However, there is also evidence that adults can maintain linguistic representations for
decades without active use. For example, Bahrick (1984; 1987) demonstrated that
vocabulary learned in college Spanish classes was maintained after as much as 50 years
without significant maintenance or reuse. This type of “permastore” corresponds to what
we find in people who continued using L1 through adolescence, but then ceased its use
during adulthood. These speakers retain their ability to use their L1 despite years of disuse
(Schmid and Dusseldorp 2010). We can refer to these speakers as “maintainers”, because
they manage to maintain their L1 abilities despite years of disuse. We can contrast people in
this group with “attriters” who show a greater loss of L1 forms. Within this group, we can
contrast “strong attriters” who have undergone the greatest amount of attrition with “weak
attriters” who show less attrition, but still not full maintenance. What is puzzling for
standard psychological theories of forgetting is that even the strongest attriters maintain a
large amount of their L1, despite years of disuse (Steinkrauss and Schmid in press). We can
also distinguish a third group of adult L2 learners that maintains use of L1 in various aspects
of daily life. Because this group suffers minimally from attrition, we can refer to them as
“late bilinguals”. There are no sharp cutoffs between these three groups; rather they
represent various points along a continuum of degree of language attrition. Understanding
why a speaker ends up at a given point along this continuum constitutes a further aspect of
this puzzle.
Puzzle #2: Variation across Levels
Both attriters and maintainers show the impact of an increasingly stronger L2 on a
somewhat weakened L1. These effects can reveal themselves through the inappropriate use
of L2 words, expressions, and structures while speaking L1. In such cases, we can say that L1
and L2 are competing for activation and that the L2 form is used because the L1 form is
weaker. There are at least five ways in which this competition can play out.1. First, intrusion of an L2 form when speaking L1 may arise from problems retrieving
the L1 form. If the activation of the L1 form is insufficient, the L2 form will win out in
the horse race for activation and production (Ratcliff 1978). This effect underscores
the extent to which L2 remains active, if somewhat repressed, during production of
L1.
2. In a related case, the weaker activation of the L1 form can lead to a total failure to
recall the required form. In such cases, we see omissions, hesitations, and other
disfluencies without actual intrusion of an L2 form.
3. When L1 and L2 share words or constructions, it can happen that both sources of
activation support the use of the same form (Tokowicz and MacWhinney 2005). In
such cases, intrusions may be scarcely noticed. This is particularly likely in closely-
related languages, such as Norwegian and Danish.
4. In other cases, it may be that the L2 form is slightly more appropriate in the given
context than the L1 form. This type of transfer from L2 resembles what we see in
cases of lexical insertion during code-switching (Myers-Scotton 2005; Poplack 1980)
in which a speaker will insert an L2 word into an L1 matrix sentence because it
seems like the môt juste or most appropriate form in a particular context. It would
be a mistake to think of this use of an L2 form as indicative of a weakened L1
alternative.
5. If a speaker’s L1 has marked dialect features, the contrast between those features
and the features of the standard version of L1 can further complicate the
competition between L1 variants and L2. What may appear to be an error in L1 may
simply be a reliance on a non-standard form. In some cases, the form in question
may derive from an earlier standard L1 form that has now fallen out of use. Such
competitions between alternative forms can lead to delays or errors in retrieval.
What complicates matters further is that these alternative forms of competition and
transfer work in different ways across the language levels of output phonology, input
phonology, lexicon, collocation, syntax, and pragmatics. For output phonology, Schmid
(2011) has shown that maintainers are perceived as having the accent of native speakers,
although strong attriters may eventually lose their native accent. We know that second
language learners show a type of backward transfer in terms of shifts in the details of their
control of phonetic features, such as voice onset time (VOT) for stop consonants (Major
1992) during the process of L2 learning. The fact that this happens so quickly during early
stages of L2 learning is surprising, given the relative resistance of L1 phonology to loss in
language attrition. However, the variations that L2 learning forces on L1 phonetics are not
so extreme as to push L1 sounds out of the normal range; rather, they represent deviations
within the overall range of potential L1 sounds. Basic syntactic patterns also seem resistant
to loss during attrition. However, attriters can begin to reduce their use of marked orders
and formats, avoiding some of the more complex L1 forms they would have used in earlier
years. These adjustments amount to minor losses of L1 forms and fluency (Schmid and
Fägersten 2010). Complete abandonment of L1 syntax under the pressure of L2 learning
seems to be minimal, even in strong attriters.
The relative resistance of phonological and syntactic structures to attrition contrasts
with greater attrition in vocabulary, idioms, and collocations. There are three theoretical
approaches to explaining this contrast. A basic usage-based or frequentist account predicts
that the least frequent L1 words should be the ones most subject to L2 intrusion. A further
consequence of this would be that the first forms that are lost are also the ones that werelearned last during L1 acquisition (Wixted 2004). However, in a careful study of frequency
effects on these intrusions, Schmid (2011) finds only marginal effects for lexical or
collocational frequency. A second account, based on the theory of between-language
competition, suggests that intrusions arise from forces such as the appropriateness of the L2
form, contextual support for code-switching, and structural similarities between L1 and L2.
A third approach focuses on the contrast between procedural and declarative memory
systems (Ullman 2001). Here, the idea is that entrenchment operates most strongly for
systems such as output phonology and word order patterning that have undergone
proceduralization through basal ganglion and striate functioning (Stocco, et al. 2010),
whereas lexical and collocational patterns that are more responsive to hippocampal
consolidation are more susceptible to intrusion. Figuring out which of these three accounts
for the contrasting effects of linguistic levels is operative in a given case is a major challenge
for studies of language attrition.
Puzzle #3: Childhood forgetting
Of the four puzzles related to language attrition, the third is the most perplexing. This
puzzle arises from the observation that children who are adopted into a new family in a new
country before the age of 8 show a nearly complete loss of the ability to use their L1 (Pallier,
et al. 2003; Ventureyra, et al. 2004). A basic psycholinguistic characterization of the process
of entrenchment would predict that this should not happen. If a child is younger than age 4
when coming to a new country, one could argue that their language had not yet fully
consolidated and was therefore vulnerable to complete language loss. However, by age 8, a
child will have spent six years making continual daily use of the L1 in fully appropriate social
contexts. Based on Bahrick’s (1984) findings regarding the entry of memories into a
“permastore”, these children should have thoroughly consolidated or “overlearned” their L1
by the age of 8. The type of natural learning that children experience is particularly well
suited to the development of long-term consolidation (Pashler, et al. 2007; Pavlik and
Anderson 2008). Moreover, studies of monolingual first language learners demonstrate
entrenchment well before the age of 8. For example, Brooks and Tomasello (1999) showed
strong entrenchment effects for item-based patterns in causative constructions in English by
age 5. These considerations indicate that late adoptees should retain a significant amount of
L1 knowledge in permastore. At the very least, this knowledge should facilitate rapid
relearning or recognition of L1 forms (MacLeod 1988). However, studies of adoptee’s L1
relearning during adolescence have provided only weak evidence of any retention of L1
sensitivities, as revealed through somewhat more accurate relearning of some phonetic
contrasts (Au, et al. 2008; Oh, et al. 2010; Oh, et al. 2003; Park 2015; Singh, et al. 2011).
However, even these results may be due to motivational factors, rather than stored
memories.
There are two solutions that have been offered to this puzzle of childhood forgetting.
The most popular solution is the Critical Period Hypothesis (CPH) which attributes childhood
L1 loss to the expiration of a critical period for language acquisition. However, that theory
was intended to account for language learning, not language loss. Nonetheless, it might be
possible to relate early language loss to neurodevelopmental processes that impact both
the ability to learn and the ability to lose a language. For example, declines in susceptibility
to loss could be related to increases in the myelination of cortical layers. On this account, a
high level of neuronal plasticity facilitates new learning, but also permits quick loss of new
patterns.The theory of Universal Grammar offers a related viewpoint on this issue, particularly as
elaborated in terms of “biolinguistics” (Boeckx and Grohmann 2007). On this account, L1
learning involves the setting of a series of parameters. Problems with resetting these
parameters are supposed to be at the root of difficulties adult learners have acquiring L2. In
accord with the CPH, parameter setting by children is labile and incomplete, allowing for
reversal and modification during childhood, but not afterwards. The actual neuronal
implementation of this version of the CPH account could conceivably rely on the same
neuronal mechanisms used to support other accounts based on entrenchment and plasticity.
A second approach focuses changes in the social and emotional supports needed for
language maintenance. Schumann (1975, 1979, 2004) argues that first language learning
links in more directly to emotional roots than does second language learning. In addition,
we need to consider the extent to which adoption and immigration can break off links
between language and the original social and experiental contexts to which linguistic forms
refer. Moreover, childhood forgetting may arise from the involvement of additional
neuronal circuitry supporting changes in attention and motivation. We will consider these
two accounts – critical periods vs. abrupt contextual change – in further detail later.
Puzzle #4: Catastrophic Interference
The fourth and final puzzle derives as a further complication from the third. This puzzle
involves the fact that parallel distributed processing (PDP) connectionist models of second
language acquisition demonstrate “catastrophic interference” or complete loss of L1 at the
beginning of learning of a second language. This occurs because L2 knowledge overwrites
the connection weights established during L1 learning (Zevin 2012). The fact that adult
maintainers demonstrate minimal language loss argues strongly against models predicting
such catastrophic loss. At the same time, developers of these models could point to
catastrophic loss in children as evidence in support of their account. There are also other
neural network models, such as DevLex (Li, et al. 2007) that avoid the problem of
catastrophic interference through reliance on learning through self-organizing feature maps.
However, those models then have no ready account of the phenomena of language loss by
children.
The Competition Model
Taken together, these four puzzles indicate that no single-process model will be
sufficient to account for the observed phenomena in language attrition. A model that
combines the mechanism of entrenchment with a model of transfer would come close to
explaining some of the puzzles, particularly if it incorporates a theory of differences
between linguistic levels. However, a full account of these phenomena will require still
further detail regarding social and motivational inputs, contextual changes, internal
processing mechanisms for consolidation, and neurological foundations of plasticity and
reorganization.
The Competition Model (MacWhinney 2015b; MacWhinney in press) is designed to
provide an integrated approach to these issues, as well as to additional issues in online
language processing, first and second language learning, bilingualism, code-switching, and
language loss in aphasia. The model holds that language, as a fundamentally biological
system, emerges from processes of competition. Like other emergent biological systems,
language structure derives from properties and interactions unique to hierarchically
organized levels of processing that interoperate across differential timescales. Implicationsof the emergentist constructs of competition, levels, and timescales are further explored in
MacWhinney (2015a).
This view of language structure as emerging from competing motivations (MacWhinney,
et al. 2014) is based on mechanisms that have been documented by experimental
psychology, cognitive linguistics, sociolinguistics, typology, neuroscience, conversation
analysis, and social research. However, we do not yet understand how these competing
component processes fit together cooperatively into a functional system. This means that
use of the model to account for patterns of language attrition requires extensive
consideration of the ways in which competing motivations and forces are integrated.
For the study of language attrition, the most important aspects of Competition Model
analysis are those relating to the interplay between risk factors and protective factors. Risk
factors are forces that operate to reduce smooth language learning and functioning.
Support factors are forces that work to promote fluent language functioning. The model
specifies the risk factors of entrenchment, transfer, over-analysis, and isolation, and the
support factors of resonance, decoupling, chunking, and participation. The processes of
overanalysis and chunking apply mostly to the first stages of language acquisition, so we will
not consider them here. Let us consider how the other six factors (entrenchment, transfer,
isolation, participation, decoupling, and resonance) operate in the case of language attrition.
Entrenchment
The basic unit of Competition Model analysis is the cue. Cues are relations between
forms and functions (de Saussure 1915/1966). Cues can involve units on any level of
linguistic structure – phonology, lexicon, or grammar. If a cue correctly predicts a function
during comprehension or selects out the correct expression during production, then it is
high in reliability. Competition Model studies (MacWhinney in press) have shown that,
during early stages of language learning, cue frequency or availability is more important
than reliability. However, over time, cue reliability becomes the major determinant of cue
strength. Cue availability and reliability are estimated through corpus-based counts (Ellis, et
al. 2015; McDonald 1989), whereas cue strength is estimated through experimental studies
that place different cues into competition (MacWhinney and Bates 1989). A core finding of
these studies is that cue reliability closely predicts cue strength. Like other models that are
implemented in the neural network framework, the Competition Model assumes that cues
are in continual competition and that this competition is determined through cue strength.
Entrenchment arises from the continual use of a cue. When a cue is reliable, strength is
increased; when it is unreliable, strength is decreased (McDonald and Heilenman 1991).
Entrenchment from this process of cue strengthening must play a central role in language
maintenance and attrition. However, the four puzzles we have discussed suggest that
entrenchment cannot work alone, and that its operation may be quite complex. Recent
work in neurobiology has begun to uncover some of the mysteries of entrenchment in
sensory areas. Examining the neuronal basis of amblyopia (poor visual acuity) arising from a
lazy eye, researchers (Takesian and Hensch 2013) have demonstrated an interplay between
five neurobiological forces that lead to the entrenchment of a cortical region and those that
can reopen that area for new learning.
1. Initial brakes. Before the onset of entrenchment, the polysialic acid/neural cell
adhesion molecule (PSA-NCAM) prevents the opening of a cortical area to learning.
2. Triggers. A sensitive period opens when molecular triggers (such as orthodenticle
homeobox 2, BDNF)—in response to sensory input—promote parvalbumin (PV) cell
maturation, turning on GABA circuit functioning. GABA circuit maturation mayoperate by suppressing responses to intrinsic activity, allowing a focus on extrinsic
input (Sale, et al. 2007; Toyoizumi, et al. 2013; van Versendaal, et al. 2012).
3. Learning. Learning then involves physical pruning and homeostatic regrowth of
synapses by tPA, TNFα, and protein synthesis.
4. Terminal brakes. A consolidated or entrenched state is maintained by the
production of functional molecular brakes, such as Lynx1 and NgR1, and physical
brakes such as PNN and myelin, which may limit plasticity by preventing further
structural changes. These brakes rely on the same processes that created changes
during the plastic period, essentially preserving these changes.
5. Reopeners. The reopening of cortical areas to new inputs can be achieved by lifting
the brakes through epigenetic manipulation (HDAC inhibitors) or heightened
attention (neuromodulators such as 5-HT, Ach, NE).
The operation of this system of excitation and inhibition across sensory levels varies
based on the timing of maturation of the PV cells that trigger the opening of the learning
period. The variability in these distributions of PV cells could help us understand variations
in entrenchment and maintenance across language levels. Because entrenchment can be
reversed through attentional processes, we should think of this system as one supporting
variable entrenchment, rather than an irreversible critical period. We should also note that
research to date has focused on the operation of these brakes and reopeners in sensory
systems. How they operate in motor areas and higher cortical regions is not yet clear,
although the neurobiological components are common across areas.
Transfer
Entrenchment constitutes a risk factor for L2 learning, because it restricts the availability
of cortical areas for new learning, forcing the learner to engage in transfer of L1 forms to L2.
At the same time, entrenchment serves as a protective factor promoting L1 maintenance, as
opposed to L1 loss. However, once L2 has become established as the primary means of daily
communication, transfer from an increasingly stronger L2 to L1 begins to operate against
the forces of L1 entrenchment.
Because of the emphasis it places on interactive activation, the Competition Model
holds that, for initial L2 learning, “everything that can transfer will”. In the domain of
phonology, whenever an L1 phoneme can be mapped onto an L2 sound, learners will
attempt to transfer that form and slowly correct for the inevitable mismatch. For lexicon,
the meanings of L1 words will transfer, although the sounds typically will not. In morphology,
transfer is seldom possible except between closely-related languages. In syntax, transfer will
impact collocations and even basic word order. In each of these areas, what will transfer
from L1 is the unmarked pattern. Studies of transfer in L2 learning largely support these
predictions. There is evidence that they also apply to language attrition, as an increasingly
stronger L2 begins to transfer patterns to L1. For example, Toth (2007) compiled an
inventory of transfer patterns in Hungarian and German L1 speakers in the San Francisco
Bay area. He could identify an L2 English source for each erroneous form he observed. The
patterns of language transfer found in such studies also closely resemble those reported in
cases of simultaneous childhood bilingualism (Döpke 1998; Döpke 2000; Yip and Matthews
2007).
Looking in greater detail at areas of particular susceptibility to transfer, some studies
(Ribbert and Kuiken 2010; Seliger 1989) have suggested that transfer is particularly strong in
areas where uses of an L1 form constitute a subset of uses of a similar, but more general, L2
form. This finding is in accord with the Competition Model expectation that the degree ofinterference from L2 to L1 will depend on the closeness of the mapping, as well as the
markedness of forms in L1 and L2 (Eckman 1977; Eckman 2011).
Because of its emphasis on competition, interaction, and variation, the Competition
Model also predicts back transfer from L2 to L1, as well as partial merger of grammar in
certain areas. Such effects have been observed for syntactic structure (Dussias and Sagarra
2007; Dussias 2004; Liu, et al. 1992), lexicon (Malt, et al. 2015), and phonology (Major 1992;
Mennen 2004), sometimes arising after only a few weeks of exposure to L2 (Chang 2012).
Thus, when studying speakers of two or more languages, we must always keep in mind the
possibility that there will be dynamic interactions between the languages (Cook 2003).
However, such interactions do not, in themselves, constitute full language attrition.
Participation, Isolation, and Identity
For successful L2 learning, the single greatest protective factor is the ability to
participate actively in L2 social groups without having to rely on switches to L1. Conversely,
the greatest risk factor for L2 learners is the threat of isolation from L2 groups. De Bot and
Clyne (De Bot and Clyne 1989; De Bot and Clyne 1994) have described situations in which
immigrants give up on attempting to integrate with the L2 community and revert to reliance
on L1. However, there are also cases in which immigrants integrate so thoroughly with the
L2 community that they cease daily use of L1. This is the situation that gives rise to Puzzle #2
regarding the maintenance of an unused L1 in permastore.
Schmid (2002) conducted an examination of attrition effects in Jews who escaped to
Anglophone countries from Germany between early adolescence and young adulthood at
various times during the Fascist pogroms. If they escaped before the onset of the racial
discrimination laws, these people tended to maintain a high level of functional use of
German, along with a basic acceptance of their German heritage. However, people who
escaped after the Nov. 1938 pogrom and the beginnings of deportations tended to reject
their German language and heritage. Schmid found that the single best predictor of degree
of language attrition in this group was the time of leaving Germany. Although this is an
extreme case, it still serves to reveal the importance of fundamental cultural identification
as either a risk or protective factor for language maintenance.
There are two ways in which cultural identity can play out on a daily level. For those who
have decided to reject their L1 identity, there can be active suppression of L1 words and
thoughts. This type of suppression of L1 can be accompanied by enthusiastic use of new L2
forms both in conversation and in inner speech, formulation, and planning. The other way in
which cultural identity can play out in everyday life is through the organization of activities
in L1 and L2. Schmid (2011) reports that ongoing use of L1 in a professional context is a
good predictor of a minimal level of L1 attrition. For example, the need to use L1 for
translation or writing requires ongoing attention to correct use of L1 forms. Conversely, if L1
usage is confined to less demanding environments such as the home or if it is being used in
code-switched interactions, then relatively more attrition will occur.
The link between identity and language maintenance may also help us understand
Puzzle #3 regarding children’s forgetting of L1. For many adoptees, life in the L1 setting may
have been relatively unstable and harsh. Moreover, the new L2 environment provides little
support for or even recognition of L1. Because of this, adoptees may have also decided to
actively repress their L1. Burling (1959) presents a rather poignant case of this type. During
a two-year-long field trip in the hills of Myanmar, his son acquired Garo and English
simultaneously. On the airplane flight home to the States, the three-year-old boy attemptedto speak to the flight attendant in Garo and she only replied in English. After that, he never
used a word of Garo again.
Resonance
In second language learning, the effects of L1 entrenchment can be countered through
the process of resonance. This process is supported by resonant connections between the
hippocampus and cortical areas, leading to the consolidation of memories and linkages in
the cortex. The hippocampus has connections to all cortical areas, each arranged in distinct
subareas. When a new experience or episode is encountered, the hippocampus uses these
connections to maintain an ongoing interaction or conversation with these cortical areas.
This is not a one-shot activation of the cortex, but a process of ongoing maintenance of
cortical activity (Nadel, et al. 2000) through reentrant connections (Wittenberg, et al. 2002).
These patterns of activation go beyond mere consolidation of individual episodes.
Relying on additional control from medial prefrontal areas, the consolidation process can
link new experiences with old concepts into increasingly rich conceptual networks
(Schlichting, et al. 2014; Zeithamova, et al. 2012). This method of building up new relational
networks from new experiences can be particularly important for consolidation of language
structures such as words and collocations, as specified in the Competition Model theory of
learning from item-based patterns (MacWhinney 2014). For people who are trying to
maintain their L1 in an L2 environment, resonance can rely both on continued L1 input from
conversation and reading, as well as internal use of L1 for formulation and planning.
Resonance can operate both passively and actively. Its passive operation can be detected
during rest (Karni and Sagi 1995) and sleep (Lindsay and Gaskell 2010). Its active function
arises when learners use orthography to activate phonology (Share 1995) or when they
derive word meanings from analysis of derivational and inflectional patterns (Presson, et al.
2013).
There is also a second form of consolidation that is important for motor and sequential
procedures. This system utilizes frontal-striatal and basal ganglion structures (thalamus,
striatum, cingulate, precuneus, substantia nigra, globus pallidus) in coordination with the
cerebellum to coordinate and proceduralize smoothly functioning action sequences for
speech and syntax (Graybiel 1998; Hinaut and Dominey 2013). Although attriters may have
developed these patterns in earlier years, they may need to reactivate these processes to
maintain fluency.
These two systems for resonant consolidation allow the language learner to avoid the
potential problem of catastrophic interference. Although L1 and L2 may share some
phonological and semantic resources, the connections between linguistic elements are
structured to maintain a separate pattern of connectivity, even if they reside in neighboring
areas of the cortex.
The role of resonance in language learning helps us understand puzzle #3 and the
problems faced by international adoptees. During their first years of language learning, all
children work intensely on the learning of systems for audition and motor planning. These
systems rely on statistical learning {Thiessen, 2015 #12426}, rather than resonance, for
consolidation. These are the systems that show the clearest entrenchment during L1
learning. On the other hand, resonance is centrally involved in the learning of the higher
linguistic levels of lexicon, morphology, collocation, syntax, clause combination, narrative,
dialog, and discourse. Learning on these levels requires support from resonant connections
based on episodic encounters with objects, events, and situations. For the youngest learners,
these connections depend heavily on direct support from specific situations, people, andobjects. Later, as children start to rely increasingly on inner speech, language forms
resonate more and more with one another independent of the environmental context. For
example, 3- and 4-year-olds can recite only a few short songs 4, but when they are a few
years older they will repeat much longer songs with ease.
If a child is removed from the original language context before being able to make
extensive internal resonant connections, their L1 will be missing the crucial match to the
situational context that it needs for support. The result of this rapid and forced
environmental change is a type of linguistic amnesia that impacts systems depending on
resonance more than systems depending on statistical learning.
Resonance may also be involved in the phenomenon of permastore. Bahrick
emphasized the fact that his subjects made minimal use of Spanish after the end of their
courses in college. However, because these forms were learned through internal resonant
processes initially, rather than through direct contact with environmental experiences,
there may have been enough ongoing resonant links between these forms and other L1
forms to show evidence of retention even decades later.
Decoupling
Successful second language learning depends on the decoupling of L2 from its
dependence on L1 (Kroll, et al. 2010). To the degree that a speaker can use resonance to
construct each language as a (partially) separately activated neural circuit, the effects of
transfer can be minimized. To achieve decoupling, an L2 learner must combine inhibition of
L1 with resonant activation of L2. In addition to the underlying cognitive processing involved
in resonance, learners and maintainers may need to establish social and attitudinal methods
for decoupling their two languages. If use of L1 can be localized to contexts that require
minimal competition with L2, there can be greater decoupling and maintenance of the two
systems. At this point, the second language learner is functioning in a more truly bilingual
fashion.
The fact that lexical semantics and idiomatic expressions are particularly subject to
intrusion from L2 can be related to the fact L2 learning relies so heavily on L1 resources in
this area. In effect, the two languages derive their meanings from similar experiences in the
world. However, even here, careful use of resonance and decoupling can pull apart forms
based on fine-grained distinctions.
Phonological processes must also involve shared resources between L1 and L2. However,
in this case, L1 has experienced earlier consolidation through the fronto-striatal
proceduralization system and fine-tuning involves the development of recombinations of
these gestures to support L2.
Conclusions
Language is a dynamic, emergent system (van Geert and Verspoor 2015), grounded on
complex inputs from biology and society. As such, we should not be surprised that theories
of language acquisition and loss must refer to a wide range of processes to understand
language patterning across individuals, groups, language levels, and language change. To
solve the four puzzles involved in language attrition, we need to refer to various
combinations of these processes. The conclusions we reach here are very close to those
developed in Steinkrauss and Schmid (in press).
Entrenchment is certainly involved in the initial consolidation of L1. However, as we now
know, entrenchment is not irreversible. If life events force a person to abandon their L1,
they can avoid use of that language, emphasize decoupling and resonance in L2, andactively suppress internal use of L1. This type of abandonment of L1 is most easily achieved
by young learners of L2. For them, higher linguistic levels are particularly vulnerable to the
loss of specific contextual supports for the L1 world.
Speakers who do not seek to abandon their L1 will still need to deal with the pressures
of transfer from an increasingly robust L2. The exact nature of these transfer phenomena
depends on the strength and accessibility of the L1 pattern, as well as the nature of the
match between L1 and L2.
Because learners can make use of resonant connections to decouple L1 from L2, they
can avoid the problem of catastrophic interference. In effect, each language becomes a
separate functional circuit, while still sharing common resources at the level of articulatory
output and semantic reference. Because it is difficult to fully decouple languages at these
levels, they remain susceptible to at least some transfer from L2 or L1-L2 merger.
By comparing the processes determining the shape of language attrition with those
involved in L1 and L2 acquisition, as well as language loss in aphasia and dementia, we can
gain an increasingly deeper understanding of the emergent structure of human language.
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