First language attrition in the twenty-first century

This chapter presents a state-of-the art review of the field of first language attrition. This is done by first providing a brief overview of the field so far, with a special focus on the current psycholinguistic perspective of L1 changes in the early stages of L2 development. The critical questions and issues that dominate the field are presented, as well as a review of methods that have been and are currently used to tackle these questions. The chapter ends with an outlook to future directions.