Language Attrition and Multilingualism

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>First language attrition can be seen as the reverse side of the coin of bilingual development. It is a process in which the first language changes, momentarily or longer term, under the influence of a second language system. This contribution explores the shape that such changes can take, with particular emphasis on dichotomous features (e.g., grammatical concord), which do not allow variability and are perceived as straightforward violations when not observed, versus features which are context‐based and distributional, or gradient and variable. We furthermore consider the evolution of theoretical frameworks and the predictions they make for the attritional process.</jats:p>