Posted: Nov 30, 2010 1:01 pm
katja z wrote:No, I was going by the distinction made in the article you linked, between people who acquired ASL before puberty (early/native learners), and after. All of them were bilingual, however:The study involved 27 bilingual subjects. Sixteen were hearing persons born to deaf parents. They learned ASL and English from birth as native languages. The remaining 11 were the late learners who had English as their native language and learned ASL after puberty, in early adulthood.
So this study is about native vs. late acquisition, not about early vs. late acquisition of the first language. That's why I said this was only indirect evidence. We can't really acquire hard data about the effects of late (post-puberty) acquisition of the first language short of the kind of experiment you suggested above
True, I hadn't read that far down.. I don't think we could say much about what it suggests though, since they are effectively learning a second language and not "late-learners" in the sense of a critical period.