A method for the assessment of competence in language is suggested that allows a new approach to the study of the sources and conditions of competence development. The method builds on the functional analysis of text building behavior, making use of the discontinuities in produced text as the only reliable observations from a scientific point of view. The method is known as Perspective Text Analysis. It characterizes the mechanism that has been discovered to govern text production and to foster an understanding of the actual processes of movement in language. The functional analysis of qualitative stability in text building behavior incorporates the double aspect of time into the approach, partly through an algorithm that takes care of the dynamics in text building behavior, and partly through the sequencing in text production that secures its evolutionary aspect. Aspects of competence are presented concerning five different areas. By means of global state attractors resulting from the perspective of anticipated consequences, mental determinants are presented. On the basis of established temporal morphologies, the kinds of determinants that constrain one's thinking under various experimental conditions are shown. Five tables illustrate concepts under discussion. (Contains 35 references.) (SLD)