Sensitive period

A developmental interval when experience has an especially strong effect on a particular ability. Effects outside the interval may still occur, but are often weaker or require more effort.

Neuroplasticity: The nervous system’s capacity to change its structure or function in response to experience, learning, or injury. Sensitive periods arise when neural circuits are especially responsive to particular experiences.
Ocular dominance plasticity: The developmental change in how strongly visual cortical neurons respond to input from either eye. Early abnormal input can shift eye dominance, a classic model of visual sensitivity.
Konrad Lorenz: An Austrian zoologist who helped establish ethology and studied imprinting in young birds. His work on imprinting shaped early discussions of timed learning in development.
Developmental critical period: A developmental interval when a particular input is required for a normal outcome and later recovery is sharply limited. This stricter concept distinguishes obligatory timing from heightened but nonexclusive sensitivity.
Synaptic pruning: The elimination or weakening of synaptic connections during development and learning. Experience-dependent pruning helps tune circuits during some sensitive periods.
Language acquisition: The process by which people acquire the ability to understand and use language. Early language experience strongly influences later fluency and phonological perception.
Torsten Wiesel: A Swedish neurophysiologist who studied visual processing and cortical development. His experiments with Hubel revealed time-sensitive effects of abnormal visual input.
Sensitive-period hypothesis: The proposal that some capacities are acquired most readily during particular developmental intervals. It applies the sensitive-period idea specifically to language learning and its timing.
Critical period: A developmental window in which a specific experience is necessary for typical development, with limited later compensation. It contrasts with sensitive periods, which usually allow learning outside the favored window.
Phoneme discrimination: The ability to distinguish speech sounds that can differentiate words in a language. Infants’ sensitivity to speech contrasts changes with exposure during the first year.

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