There are 12 chapters in this edited work. Chapter 1 discusses theoretical issues, and the other 11 chapters report research on language acquisition. Part 1, “The Early Acquisition of Two or More Languages within the Family Context,” focuses on early bilingualism and trilingualism and has six chapters on different combinations of languages, including Galician, Basque, Catalan, Spanish, and English. The research studies reported in this section differ regarding the age of the children (from 8 months to 10 years of age), the focus of the study (monolingual vs. bilingual development, vocabulary, grammar, pragmatics, language impairment), and the design of the research studies (longitudinal, cross-sectional, case studies, large samples), but each analyzes language development in children exposed to two or more languages from an early age. Part 2, “Bilingual and Multilingual Acquisition at Later Ages and in Instructional Settings,” has five chapters: four on the acquisition of English and one on the acquisition of Catalan. The age range for participants in these chapters is wider (5 years to adulthood) as well as the areas discussed (teaching strategies, crosslinguistic influence, individual factors in third language acquisition, phonological and grammatical development). The theoretical and methodological approaches employed also differ to a great extent regarding the data collection procedures, the characteristics of the samples, and the design and aims of the studies.

This book thus provides important information about different areas and methods in language acquisition studies carried out in Spain and may have international interest. The range of topics and methodological approaches used reflects the diversity and the different existing possibilities of conducting research on language acquisition but does not add internal coherence to the work. Furthermore, the title may inadvertently be associated with language use of Spanish young persons considered as a group.