DOES AGE AFFECT SECOND LANGUAGE ACQUISITION?

Abstract

Language development and age are related in some aspects. There has been debate concerning the relationship between age and language learning for a long time. It is often believed that kids pick up languages more quickly than adults do. Hence, this article is aimed to determine about the age differences between young and adult language learners, the critical period theory, and the effect of age on second language learning. This study was conducted as library research that focused on the relationship between age and second language acquisition. The data was obtained from research articles that had been published at any period in indexed national or international publications. The result of this article is that there are other factors besides age that affect language acquisition. There are other additional elements that contribute to language development, both internal and external. Some experts claim that youngsters are only better in some areas, like as pronounciation, while being weaker in others, such as morphology, compared to the greater morphological skills of adult learners. The critical period hypothesis, a theory that contends that learning a second language is ideally started at an early age, supports the researcher's final finding that age affects the process of language acquisition.