Introduction: Language acquisition and sociolinguistic variation

International audienceThe special issue appears in a new scientific landscape of innovative attempts to link sociolinguistics and cognitive psycholinguistics. Studies on acquisition of variation have been conducted since the late 1960s, but the changing scientific landscape gives them a new impetus. On the one hand, our work draws on and contributes to sociolinguistics. As a result, it focuses on the acquisition of sociolinguistic patterns conceived of as properties shared by communities of speakers consisting of both children and adults. At the same time, our work draws on the traditions of developmental psycholinguistics. These connections lead us to discuss the cognitive mechanisms that are involved in the acquisition of sociolinguistic variants and social meaning. The contributions of the special issue address four questions which may be the key driving issues in research in the years to come