First Language
First Language is a forum for research into how children acquire their first language, and the application of that research into practice.
First Language publishes original research, theoretical articles, review articles and book reviews in all areas of first language acquisition. Age groups studied range from neonates to adolescents. This journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE).
Multidisciplinary in scope
Child language research is multidisciplinary and this is reflected in the contents of the journal: research from diverse theoretical and methodological traditions is welcome. Authors from a wide range of disciplines - including psychology, linguistics, anthropology, cognitive science, neuroscience, communication, sociology and education - are regularly represented in our pages. Empirical papers range from individual case studies, through experiments, observational/ naturalistic, analyses of CHILDES corpora, to parental surveys.
The journal encourages submissions in all of the following areas:
- syntactic, semantic, morphological, phonological, and pragmatic development
- language and cognitive development
- language and social development
- language and educational development
- language of children with developmental disorders
- exceptional language abilities
- bilingual development
- role of parental speech
- interrelationships between language and nonverbal development
- relationships between language and literacy
- discourse analysis
- socio-economic factors and language acquisition
- preverbal communication
- language development across cultures
- language and ethnic development
- measurement and analysis issues in child language research.
Potential authors who are unsure of the relevance of their work to the journal's scope are welcome to contact the Editor directly for advice.
Special Issues
First Language occasionally publishes special issues devoted to topics of pressing interest. These are usually Guest Edited by prominent researchers in the relevant areas. Recent examples include:
- Children's acquisition of referentiality in narratives, edited by Natalia Gagarina and Ute Bohnacker
- The acquisition of complex predicates, edited by Hannah Sarvasy
- Against stored abstractions: A radical exemplar model of language acquisition, edited by Chloë Marshall.
- Syntax and verbal short term/working memory in developmental disorders, edited by Stavroula Stavrakaki
- The role of grammatical words in children's early syntactic development, edited by Anat Ninio
Society Discounts
Members of the International Association for the Study of Child Language (IASCL) are entitled to a 30% subscription discount to First Language (on the individual rate). Confirm details of your membership when ordering and quote the code IASCL.
For further information about the society visit https://www.childlanguage.org/
Members of the British Association of Applied Linguistics are entitled to a 20% subscription discount to First Language (on the individual rate). Confirm details of your membership when ordering and quote the code BAAL.
First Language is available on SAGE Journals Online.
Submit your manuscript today at https://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/fla.
First Language is an international peer reviewed journal that publishes the highest quality original research in child language acquisition. Child language research is multidisciplinary and this is reflected in the contents of the journal: research from diverse theoretical and methodological traditions is welcome. Authors from a wide range of disciplines - including psychology, linguistics, anthropology, cognitive science, neuroscience, communication, sociology and education - are regularly represented in our pages. Empirical papers range from individual case studies, through experiments, observational/ naturalistic, analyses of CHILDES corpora, to parental surveys.
The journal encourages submissions in all of the following areas: syntactic, semantic, morphological, phonological, and pragmatic development; language and cognitive development; language and social development; language and educational development; language of children with developmental disorders; exceptional language abilities; bilingual development; role of parental speech; interrelationships between language and nonverbal development; relationships between language and literacy; discourse analysis; socio-economic factors and language acquisition; preverbal communication; language development across different languages and cultures; language and ethnic development; measurement and analysis issues in child language research. Potential authors who are unsure of the relevance of their work to the journal's scope are welcome to contact the Editor directly for advice.
First Language operates a strictly blinded peer review process in which the reviewer’s name is withheld from the author and the author’s name from the reviewer. Reviewers may at their own discretion opt to reveal their name to the author in their review but our default policy practice is for both identities to remain concealed.
Each manuscript is assessed initially by the Editor to determine that it is relevant to the journal’s Aims and Scope, and that it is consistent with the scientific and editorial standards of the journal. Papers which proceed beyond this initial scrutiny are reviewed by at least two referees. All manuscripts are reviewed as rapidly as possible, and an editorial decision is generally reached within 6 - 8 weeks of submission.
Occasionally, authors wish to indicate persons whom they believe would not be able to provide unbiased review. While choice of reviewers remains ultimately a matter of editorial discretion, we aim to comply with reasonable requests. Occasionally, authors wish to recommend specialist reviewers and are free to do so. Recommendations will be taken into account, though the Editor is likely to select at least one reviewer independently.
This journal is a member of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE)
| Chloe Marshall | UCL Institute of Education, University College London, UK |
| Kirsten Abbot-Smith | University of Kent, UK |
| Núria Esteve-Gibert | Open University of Catalonia, Spain |
| Susan Foster-Cohen | University of Canterbury, New Zealand |
| Virginia C. Mueller Gathercole | Florida Atlantic University, USA |
| Kate Messenger | Lancaster University, UK |
| Judith Rispens | University of Amsterdam, Netherlands |
| Kate Rowley | University College London, UK |
| Ludovica Serratrice | University of Reading, UK |
| Yasuhiro Shirai | Case Western Reserve University, USA |
| Katherine White | University of Waterloo, Canada |
| Peng Zhou | Zhejiang University, China |
| Emily Stanford | University of Geneva, Switzerland |
| Gwen Brekelmans | Queen Mary University of London, UK |
| Seamus Donnelly | Australian National University, Australia |
| Anne Baker | Stellenbosch University, South Africa |
| Angel Chan | The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, China |
| Lourdes de León | Centro de Investigaciones y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social, Mexico |
| Julie Dockrell | UCL Institute of Education, University College London, UK |
| Maria Teresa Guasti | University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy |
| Pedro Guijarro-Fuentes | Universitat de les Illes Balears, Spain |
| Vikki Janke | University of Kent, UK |
| Gary Jones | Nottingham Trent University, UK |
| Tamar Keren-Portnoy | University of York, UK |
| Evan Kidd | Australian National University, Australia |
| Monique Mills | University of Houston, USA |
| Rama Novogrodsky | University of Haifa, Israel |
| Miguel P. Pereira | Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, Spain |
| Celia Rosemberg | University of Buenos Aires, Argentina |
| Uli Sauerland | Centre for General Linguistics, Berlin, Germany |
| Krister Schönström | Stockholm University, Sweden |
| Filip Smolík | Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Czech Republic |
| Pamela Snow | La Trobe University, Australia |
| Stavroula Stavrakaki | Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece |
| Ercenur Ünal | Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Netherlands |
| Frank Wijnen | University of Utrecht, Netherlands |
| Anita Wong | University of Sydney, Australia |
Manuscript submission guidelines can be accessed on Sage Journals.