Adults learn language to fluency nearly as well as children: study

Re:Adults learn language to fluency nearly as well as childr... by homakov on Sunday May 12, 2019 @04:48PM (#19894469)

I consider myself fluent, but I rarely talk outside of what happened on the weekend. For some reason it's harder to think outside the box when using a foreign language. I however understand 99% of what would be said on a meeting. Understanding is much easier than explaining.

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Re:Adults learn language to fluency nearly as well as childr... by sangnoir on Monday May 13, 2019 @11:11AM (#19900037)

To add on to what you said - understanding is a subset of fluency. You also need to be able to adequately explain/communicate your thinking in order to be considered fluent. This requires a sound "theory of mind for language" in order to be able to figure out when someone is misunderstanding you, and avoiding potentially confusing diction choices, which a lot of non-fluent speakers struggle with.

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Re:Adults learn language to fluency nearly as well as childr... by homakov on Monday May 13, 2019 @07:06PM (#19904952)

Then it comes to definition of fluent. To me 90% of Swedes are fluent. What you're talking about is "native", in my book.

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