FOREIGN ACCENTS, LANGUAGE ACQUISITION, AND CEREBRAL DOMINANCE¹

Abstract

It has long been accepted that children are able to master the sound patterns of a second language with much greater ease than adults. In fact, adults never seem capable of ridding themselves entirely of a “foreign accent”. There have been many attempts to account for this discrepancy in language learning between children and adults in terms of nurture, but, for the most part, these theories have proved inconsistent. It is proposed that it is the nature of the human brain, not its nurture, that is essentially involved here‐specifically, that the onset of cerebral dominance, which seems to occur around the age of twelve, inhibits the ability of a person to master the sound patterns of a second language without an impinging foreign accent.