The present study evaluates the role of age on the rate of acquiring English as a second language in an immersion setting. Subjects were children with native languages typologically very different from English. The children arrived in the United States between the ages of 7 and 12 years and were tested on their knowledge of English grammatical morphology and syntax at different lengths of stay in the United States, ranging from 6 months to 3 years. Subjects' performance was predicted by the length of their stay in the United States and by gender, with females outperforming males. Age of arrival played no role in predicting subjects' rate of acquisition. Performance was very similar between two age groups examined (7–9– and 10–12-year-old arrivals) throughout the 3 years measured. The present results suggest that, on certain aspects of grammar, different-aged children acquire a second language during the first 3 years of acquisition at similar rates when their native language is very different in typology from the target language.

Untrained native English listeners assigned foreign accent scores to sentence and narrative utterances that had been rendered unintelligible through low-pass filtering. Utterances produced by native English talkers were assigned consistently higher ratings than those produced by Mandarin-speaking learners of English, even when the listeners were unfamiliar with the content. Because these filtered speech stimuli contained very little of what could be considered segmental information, the results suggest that untrained listeners can identify foreign-accented speech on the basis of nonsegmental information alone, whether they are presented with material of known or of unknown content. Acoustical analyses of the stimuli suggested that differences in speaking rates, intonation patterns, and timing may have played a role in the listeners' assessments, although the cues to foreign-accentedness may have varied from talker to talker and from utterance to utterance. Surprisingly, no relationship was observed between the ratings of the filtered and unfiltered versions of the nonnative stimuli.

John Schumann and colleagues (Jacobs, 1988; Jacobs & Schumann, 1992; Pulvermüller & Schumann, 1994; Schumann, 1990a, 1990b) have argued for a neurobiological perspective on language acquisition, one that denies a role for a specifically linguistic mental module of the sort proposed by, for example, Chomsky (e.g., 1986). In this paper, we challenge this perspective by offering evidence that such a mental module must be involved in the acquisition of grammatical competence.

Eubank and Gregg (1995) claim that “Jacobs and Schumann wish to deny the existence of UG” (p. 42). This statement presupposes the existence of Universal Grammar (UG). However, Jacobs, Schumann, and Pulvermuller see the existence of UG and its possible neural substrate as an empirical issue and, therefore, are free to explore it, examine it, and question it. If it were demonstrated that there were, in fact, no UG, it would do great violence to Eubank and Gregg's theory. However, if it were demonstrated that UG did exist, Jacobs, Schumann, and Pulvermüller could easily accommodate this fact in their positions. Jacobs (1988) and Jacobs and Schumann (1992) point out some neural arguments against UG; Pulvermuller and Schumann (1994) actually argue for a neural specialization for grammar but not specifically a UG, and Schumann (1993, 1994) examines differential success in second language acquisition by assuming a highly canalized, neural basis for grammar.

I wish to warn young men against the invincible attraction of theories which simplify and unify seductively. Ruled by the [reticularist] theory, we who were active in histology then saw networks everywhere [italics added].… This [reticularist theory] was admirably convenient, since it did away with all need for the analytical effort involved in determining in each case the course through the gray matter followed by the nervous impulse. It has rightly been said that the reticular hypothesis, by dint of pretending to explain everything easily and simply, explains absolutely nothing; and, what is more serious, it hinders and almost makes superfluous future inquiries regarding the intimate organization of the centers [italics added]. (Ramóny Cajal, 1989, pp. 303–337)

In their paper on Universal Grammar, language acquisition, and neurobiology, Eubank and Gregg (1995) attack current attempts to specify the neurobiological correlates of language acquisition. While these authors address a large variety of topics, they make two major assertions that call for brief discussion.

First, they believe that some neurobiological accounts of language acquisition must be rejected because the authors of these accounts “give no evidence of knowing what it is that needs to be explained” (p. 53). Eubank and Gregg argue that only a language acquisition theory rooted in Government and Binding theory can be the basis of a neurobiological account of language acquisition. Government and Binding theory must be chosen because, according to these authors, it is the only welldeveloped theory of linguistic competence. To put it in a nutshell, “It is [language] acquisition theory that sets the problems for neurobiology to solve” (p. 53), and acquisition theory must conform to the Government and Binding approach. This master-and-slave view of the relationship between linguistics and biology is hard to accept, especially if one considers what Eubank and Gregg have to say about the master: Like most generative linguists, they do not hesitate to emphasize that the only well-developed linguistic theory is "not complete, of course, not yet correct in all or even most of its details, and perhaps not even in some of its fundamentals" (p. 51). It is inadequate to postulate that such a potentially insufficient construct must necessarily form the basis of biological research. This strategy may be unproductive, especially if theory-internal assumptions turn out to be wrong.

This study replicates, in the aural mode, Leow's (1993) study on the effects of simplification, type of linguistic item, and second/foreign language experience on learners' intake of linguistic items contained in written input. Aural simplified/unsimplified input with either the present perfect or present subjunctive form was made available to learners at two levels of language experience. Statistical analyses performed on the raw scores of a pre- and posttest multiple-choice recognition assessment task revealed significant main effects for type of linguistic item, language experience, and task and a significant interaction between language experience and task. While results corroborate those found in the written mode for the effects of simplification and language experience on adult learners' intake, the same did not hold true for type of linguistic item, underscoring the need for research to consider seriously the role of modality while addressing cognitive processes in SLA.