Pimsleur Language Aptitude Battery

The Pimsleur Language Aptitude Battery is an assessment developed to predict student success in foreign language learning, or language learning aptitude, and for diagnosing language learning disabilities.

The Pimsleur Language Aptitude Battery (PLAB) was developed to measure language learning aptitude. Language learning aptitude does not refer to whether or not an individual can or cannot learn a foreign language (it is assumed that virtually everyone can learn a foreign language given adequate opportunity). According to John Carroll and Stanley Sapon, the authors of the MLAT (a similar language aptitude test intended for older subjects), language learning aptitude does refer to the “prediction of how well, relative to other individuals, an individual can learn a foreign language in a given amount of time and under given conditions.” The PLAB is intended for use with students in grades 7 through 12.