ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book discusses broader theoretical issues of language aptitude and aims to examine the lacuna by focusing on testing language aptitude at the primary school level. It provides an overview of contemporary and historical cases of very gifted foreign language learners, polyglots, and savants and how they can inform research on language aptitude. The book deals with basic terms such as foreign language aptitude, linguistic giftedness, and talent, which is followed by a more in-depth discussion of the age factor and its impacts on near-native-like proficiency and the dynamic nature of foreign language aptitude. It highlights unifying characterizations of the working memory (WM) system as they relate to language acquisition, online processing, and long-term development, culminating in the central proposal of ‘WM as a language acquisition device’. The book also discusses the search for a neurocognitive aptitude model for interpreting expertise.
