DeKeyser, Robert

PATRICK REBUSCHAT

Robert DeKeyser is a Belgian applied linguist who is best known for his influential research
and publications on the cognitive aspects underlying second language acquisition (SLA)
and teaching. DeKeyser’s work covers a variety of topics, including implicit and explicit
learning, the role of practice in second language (L2) acquisition, language learning in
study-abroad settings, and age effects in L2 acquisition. The linguistic focus in DeKeyser’s
work is usually on the acquisition of L2 morphosyntax (see, e.g., DeKeyser, 1995, 1997,
1998, 2005a; Goldschneider & DeKeyser, 2001). His research has been funded by many
grants, including highly competitive awards from the National Institutes of Health, the
Spencer Foundation, and the United States Department of Education.
DeKeyser was born in Varsenare, Belgium, in 1957. He pursued his undergraduate
studies at the Catholic University of Leuven, where he obtained a BA in Romance Philology
(1979), a Diploma in Spanish Studies (1979), a Certificate of Specialization in Psycholinguistics
(1980), and his teaching credentials (French, 1980). He then moved to the United States
to study at Stanford University, where he first obtained an MA (1982) and then a PhD in
Education, with a minor in Linguistics (1986). After his doctorate, DeKeyser returned to
Belgium to work on a research project funded by the Belgian National Science Foundation,
before returning to the United States in 1988 to take up a faculty position at the Department
of Linguistics, University of Pittsburgh. He moved to the University of Maryland, College
Park, in 2005, where he is currently professor of Second Language Acquisition.
DeKeyser has published a substantial number of widely cited studies in journals such
as Studies in Second Language Acquisition, Language Learning, Applied Psycholinguistics, TESOL
Quarterly, Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, Modern Language Journal, and Language
Testing. He has contributed a large number of invited chapters to influential state-of-the
art volumes (e.g., Doughty & Williams, 1998; Robinson, 2001) and handbooks (e.g., Doughty
& Long, 2003; Kroll & de Groot, 2005). DeKeyser’s review articles have been particularly
influential and represent the first—and sometimes the only—port of call for researchers
and students interested in major topics in SLA, for example automaticity and automatization
(DeKeyser, 2001), implicit and explicit learning (DeKeyser, 2003), age effects in L2 acquisition
(DeKeyser & Larson-Hall, 2005; DeKeyser, in press), and skill acquisition theory (DeKeyser,
2007a). In addition to his article publications, DeKeyser also edited three influential volumes,
Practice in a second language (DeKeyser, 2007b), Morphosyntactic development in second language
learning (2005b), and Testing second language acquisition theory in the lab (Hulstijn & DeKeyser,
1997).
DeKeyser is also well known for his extensive service to the profession, especially in his
role as editor of Language Learning (2005–10), one of the flagship journals in the field. He
is on the advisory board of several book series and the co-editor of the Studies in Bilingualism
series, published by John Benjamins. He has also served as external PhD examiner and
external referee for promotion and tenure committees at many universities, and as ad hoc
reviewer for funding bodies.

The Encyclopedia of Applied Linguistics, Edited by Carol A. Chapelle.

© 2013 Blackwell Publishing Ltd. Published 2013 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
DOI: 10.1002/9781405198431.wbeal0311
2 dekeyser, robert

Topics and Ideas

Age Effects in Second Language Acquisition

One of the most widely debated questions in SLA research concerns the role of age in L2
acquisition. The debate focuses on a key difference between first and second language
acquisition, namely the fact that language acquisition in childhood usually results in
native-like competence in one or more languages, whereas language acquisition in adult-
hood is unlikely to be as successful. This difference between child and adult learners, also
known as the age-of-acquisition (AoA) effect, has often been explained in terms of a
critical period for language development. The idea that there might be a critical age period
for the acquisition of language is usually traced back to researchers such as Lenneberg.
According to Lenneberg (1967), language acquisition from mere exposure to the linguistic
environment is only possible before the critical period. After this period, learners cannot
rely on the same learning mechanism to acquire language, with the consequence that their
levels of ultimate attainment in the L2 will necessarily fall short of native-like ability.
The debate has centered on a series of questions, for example: Is there a critical period
for language acquisition, as suggested by Lenneberg (1967), or can the age effects in L2
acquisition be explained by other factors (differences in quality and quantity of input,
practice, social-psychological factors, etc.)? If there is a critical period, when does this
period occur and how should it be explained? How does age affect the acquisition of the
different elements of language (syntax, morphology, phonology, lexicon, etc.)? While these
and other questions continue to be subject to debate, there is empirical evidence to suggest
that younger learners do, in fact, have an advantage in ultimate attainment (though not
in rate of learning), and that this advantage holds for both pronunciation and grammar
learning. The decline of language learning ability seems to take place gradually, from ages
6–7 to 16–17. And, importantly, it appears that the AoA effect cannot be fully explained
by factors such as input, use of L1 and L2, social-psychological factors, or length of resi-
dence. For comprehensive reviews of the literature see DeKeyser and Larson-Hall (2005)
and DeKeyser (in press).
DeKeyser has been an active contributor to the debate on age effects in L2 acquisition
(see, e.g., DeKeyser, 2000, 2007a). One of his widely cited studies, DeKeyser (2000), had
two aims. The first was to extend Johnson and Newport’s (1989) correlational study. Johnson
and Newport asked native speakers of Chinese and Korean who had immigrated to the
United States at various ages (3–39) to perform on an auditory grammaticality judgment
test. Performance on the latter was used to assess their knowledge of a range of morpho-
syntactic structures in English. This allowed them to relate proficiency (as measured by
performance on the grammaticality judgments) to the age at which subjects began learning
L2 English. Johnson and Newport found a strong negative correlation of -.77 between AoA
and L2 proficiency. DeKeyser (2000) extended this study by looking at a different popula-
tion and avoiding certain methodological problems. Another aim of DeKeyser (2000) was
to test the fundamental difference hypothesis (Bley-Vroman, 1988), which states that, while
children are able to learn their native language(s) through implicit learning mechanisms,
adults have largely lost this ability and have to rely on general learning mechanisms and
analytic abilities instead. If this is the case, then one might expect verbal aptitude to play
an important role in adult, but not in child, language learning. DeKeyser thus sought to
determine whether the aptitude effect varies with age and the age effect with aptitude.
DeKeyser (2000) recruited 57 native speakers of Hungarian who were residing in the
United States. The age of arrival range was 1–40, all participants had resided in the US
for at least 10 years (average length of residence 34 years), and levels of education and
occupational status varied widely. Subjects performed on an adapted version of Johnson
 dekeyser, robert 3

and Newport’s (1989) grammaticality judgment test. In addition, subjects also completed
a Hungarian verbal ability test (Ottó, 1996). DeKeyser found a strong negative correlation
between AoA and proficiency (as assessed by the grammaticality judgments), r = -.63,
which replicated Johnson and Newport’s (1989) findings. DeKeyser also found that, after
the age of 16, only those learners with high verbal aptitude scores also achieved high scores
on the grammaticality judgment test. This suggests that the only way that an adult learner
can achieve grammatical competence similar to that of a native speaker is by using ana-
lytical, problem-solving abilities, as predicted by the fundamental difference hypothesis.
Aptitude does not predict ultimate attainment by child learners because the latter can rely
on implicit learning mechanisms. More recently, DeKeyser, Alfi-Shabtay, and Ravid (2010)
provide crosslinguistic support for these findings.

Second Language Acquisition as Skill Learning

If language acquisition in adults is qualitatively different, then how can this process be
characterized? DeKeyser contributed to this question in several studies, the most influential
being his experiment on the automatization of explicit L2 grammar rules. DeKeyser (1997)
trained 61 subjects on an artificial language (Autopractan) that consisted of 32 vocabulary
items and four morphosyntactic rules. At the beginning, subjects received explicit training
on how the artificial language worked. Once they reached criterion on a set of metalinguistic
tests, subjects received comprehension and production training for a period of eight weeks.
Comprehension practice consisted of choosing between pictures displayed on a computer
screen to match a sentence. Production practice consisted of typing the correct sentence
corresponding to the picture. Subjects were divided into three groups: Group A received
comprehension practice on rules 1 and 2, and production practice on rules 3 and 4. Group
B did the reverse, that is, comprehension practice on rules 3 and 4 and production practice
on rules 1 and 2. Group C received comprehension and production practice on all four
rules. DeKeyser (1997) found that the learning of morphosyntactic rules was highly skill-
specific, that is, large amounts of practice in comprehension and production led to great
improvements in the practiced skill but not in the reverse skill. Importantly, he also found
that these skills develop gradually over time, following the same power function learning
curve as the acquisition of other cognitive domains (e.g., geometry, computer program-
ming). DeKeyser (1997) interpreted these results as being consistent with skill acquisition
theory, an information-processing approach that defines learning as the gradual conversion
of declarative (explicit) knowledge into procedural (implicit) knowledge by means of
practice (automatization) (see DeKeyser, 2001, for an overview).

Conclusion

DeKeyser’s work has important implications for our understanding of L2 acquisition. His
work on age effects has provided strong evidence for a quantitative decline of language
learning ability and a qualitative shift in learning mechanisms (implicit vs. explicit) as a
function of age before adulthood, at least for the case of morphosyntax. Moreover, his
research on L2 acquisition has shown that providing adults with explicit knowledge can
be beneficial, assuming this is followed by ample opportunities to practice. DeKeyser’s
work thus provides evidence for an interface between explicit and implicit knowledge.
Furthermore, DeKeyser’s research suggests that adult L2 acquisition can, in fact, be con-
ceived of as an explicit learning process, that is, a learning process in which subjects rely
on their analytic abilities and not on an implicit process of induction. This process is skill-
specific and highly dependent on language aptitude, with adult learners who score high
on verbal ability measures significantly outperforming learners with low verbal ability
4 dekeyser, robert

scores. In terms of pedagogical implications, DeKeyser’s (2000, 2010) observation that explicit
learning processes are a necessary condition for achieving a high degree of proficiency in
the L2 after childhood suggests that teaching approaches that deny adult learners the value
of explicit, form-focused instruction are flawed. His work on automatization confirms
that there is, in fact, a place for systematic and extended practice of rules in the teaching
curriculum.

SEE ALSO: Automatization, Skill Acquisition, and Practice in Second Language Acquisition;
Critical Period; Explicit Knowledge and Grammar Explanation in Second Language
Instruction; Explicit Learning in Second Language Acquisition; Practice in Second Language
Instruction

References

Bley-Vroman, R. (1988). The fundamental character of foreign language learning. In W. Rutherford

& M. Sharwood Smith (Eds.), Grammar and second language teaching: A book of readings (pp. 19–30).
Rowley, MA: Newbury House.
DeKeyser, R. (1995). Learning second language grammar rules: An experiment with a miniature
linguistic system. Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 17, 379–410.
DeKeyser, R. (1997). Beyond explicit rule learning: Automatizing second language morphosyntax.
Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 19, 195–221.
DeKeyser, R. (1998). Beyond focus on form: Cognitive perspectives on learning and practicing
second language grammar. In C. Doughty & J. Williams (Eds.), Focus on form in classroom
language acquisition (pp. 42–63). New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
DeKeyser, R. (2000). The robustness of critical period effects in second language acquisition.
Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 22, 499–533.
DeKeyser, R. (2001). Automaticity and automatization. In P. Robinson (Ed.), Cognition and second
language instruction (pp. 125–51). New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
DeKeyser, R. (2003). Implicit and explicit learning. In C. Doughty & M. Long (Eds.), Handbook
of second language acquisition (pp. 313–48). Oxford, England: Blackwell.
DeKeyser, R. (2005a). What makes second-language grammar difficult? A review of issues.
Language Learning, 55, 1–25.
DeKeyser, R. (Ed.). (2005b) Morphosyntactic development in second language learning. (Special
issue) Language Learning, 55.
DeKeyser, R. (2007a) Skill acquisition theory. In J. Williams and B. VanPatten (Eds.), Theories in
second language acquisition: An introduction (pp. 97–113). Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
DeKeyser, Robert (Ed.). (2007b). Practice in a second language: Perspectives from applied linguistics
and cognitive psychology. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
DeKeyser, R. (in press). Age effects in second language learning. In S. Gass & A. Mackey (Eds.),
Handbook of second language acquisition. London, England: Routledge.
DeKeyser, R., Alfi-Shabtay, I., & Ravid, D. (2010). Cross-linguistic evidence for the nature of
age effects in second language acquisition. Applied Psycholinguistics, 31, 413–38.
DeKeyser, R., & Larson-Hall, J. (2005). What does the critical period really mean? In J. F. Kroll
& A. M. B. De Groot (Eds.), Handbook of bilingualism: Psycholinguistic approaches (pp. 88–108).
Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.
Doughty, C., & Long, M. (Eds.). (2003). Handbook of second language acquisition. Oxford, England:
Blackwell.
Doughty, C., & Williams, J. (Eds.). (1998). Focus on form in classroom language acquisition. New
York, NY: Cambridge University Press
Goldschneider, J. & R. DeKeyser (2001). Explaining the “natural order of L2 morpheme acqui-
sition” in English: A meta-analysis of multiple determinants. Language Learning, 51, 1–50.
 dekeyser, robert 5

Hulstijn, J., & R. DeKeyser (Eds.). (1997). Testing second language acquisition theory in the lab.
(Special issue) Studies in Second Language Acquisition, 19.
Johnson, J. S., & Newport, E. L. (1989). Critical period effects in second language learning: The
influence of maturational state on the acquisition of English as a second language. Cognitive
Psychology, 21, 60–99.
Kroll, J. F., & De Groot, A. M. B. (Eds.). (2005). Handbook of bilingualism: Psycholinguistic approaches.
Oxford: Oxford University Press
Lenneberg, E. H. (1967). Biological foundations of language. New York, NY: Wiley.
Ottó, I. (1996b). Hungarian language aptitude test: Words in sentences (Unpublished manuscript).
Department of English Applied Linguistics, Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest.
Robinson, P. (Ed.). (2001). Cognition and second language instruction. New York, NY: Cambridge
University Press.

Suggested Readings

Anderson, J. R. (1983). The architecture of cognition. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
DeKeyser, R. (2009). Cognitive-psychological processes in second language learning. In M. Long
& C. Doughty (Eds.), Handbook of second language teaching (pp. 119–38). Oxford, England:
Blackwell.
Singleton, D. (2001). Age and second language acquisition. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics,
21, 77–89.