PARALLELS AND DIVERGENCES IN THE ACQUISITION AND DISSOLUTION OF LANGUAGE

Analyses of the relation between the acquisition and dissolution of la nguage have typically focused on whether or not the forms of language dysfunction that result from brain damage correspond to specific stage s of language acquisition: the Regression Hypothesis. These analyses h ave not met with great success: although there are a number of superfi cial similarities between aphasic disorders and different stages of th e immature linguistic system, there are also important differences. I will suggest that a focus on the behavioral similarities between langu age acquisition and dissolution is unlikely to be productive. A more p roductive course would be to focus, instead, on the general principles that constrain the acquisition and dissolution of language.