Investigating factors contributing to first language lexical attrition in non-migrant context among Kara young adults

Abstract

Studying L1 attrition has vehemently focused on migration and child adoptions. The study of L1 attrition in multilingual societies experiencing local cross-linguistic effects has received limited concerns. Thus, factors perceived to determine attrition are limited to emigration contexts. This paper investigates factors for attrition of Kara-L1 traditional culture terms among non-migrants young adults. It is guided by the Cross-linguistic Influence Hypothesis (CLI).  The study is generally qualitative, and it employs a case study design. It used oral and written data collected through verbal fluency tests, direct vocabulary elicitation tasks, picture naming tasks, surveys and unstructured interviews administered to 30 participants recruited purposively. These were young adults (N=15) as the target group as well as mid-aged and older adults as the control group (N=15). The participants were snowballed from the family and friends as recruiting agents.  Data analysis adhered to the six-phase thematic analysis. The findings of the study revealed that factors for L1 attrition are multiple, varying from one context of attrition to another. However, some factors are cross-cultural, cutting across at least many instances of cross-linguistic interference. They are also dependent on aggregate attrition since no single factor can cause attrition. The current study recommends redirection of approaches to attrition cases in African multilingual contexts; hence, avoid focusing on migration and examine the prevailing exposure of ethnic languages to superior languages like English, Swahili, and French.