Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP17623
Authors: Shlomo Weber; William Brock; Bo Chen; Steven Durlauf
Abstract: Immigrants in economies with a dominant native language exhibit substantial heterogeneities in language acquisition of the majority language. We model partial equilibrium language acquisition as an equilibrium phenomenon. We consider an environment where heterogeneous agents from various minority groups choose whetherto acquire a majority language fully, partially, or not at all. Different acquisition decisions confer different communicative benefits and incur different costs. We offer an equilibrium characterization of language acquisition strategies and find that partial acquisition can arise as an equilibrium behavior. We also show that a language equilibrium may exhibit insufficient learning relative to the social optimum. In addition, we provide a local stability analysis of steady state language equilibria. Finally, we discuss econometric implementation of the language acquisition model and establish econometric identification conditions.
Keywords: communicative benefits; identification; language acquisition; language policy; linguistic equilibrium; partial learning
JEL Codes: C72; D61; J15; Z13
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| Decision to fully, partially, or not at all acquire majority language (C70) | Costs and benefits associated with each choice (D61) |
| High costs of full learning (D29) | More individuals opt for partial learning (J24) |
| Partial acquisition (G34) | Higher number of partial learners than full learners (C35) |
| Equilibrium structure of language acquisition decisions (C62) | Overall learning outcomes in the population (I21) |
| Dynamics of language acquisition (C69) | Persistent patterns of partial learning (C92) |
| Insufficient learning relative to social optimum (D89) | Structure of language acquisition decisions (D87) |