Acquisition of Discourse at 4—5 Years of Age: Functional Dynamic Analysis of the Impact of Genre and Register on the Part-of-Speech Profile

204

Abstract

Despite a long history of studies in the discourse, we still lack systematic investigations in the discourse acquisition at the preschool and pre-primary school age. Namely, the influence of variables, such as discourse genre, communication register, socio-pragmatic skills, on different linguistic parameters almost has not been investigated yet. Hence, the given study aimed at the corpus-based analysis of different child discourse genres with the main focus on the Part-of-Speech (PoS) Profile. First, each child told three personal narratives, then generated a fictional story according to the picture sequence, and had an informal chat during five individual sessions. Then, five subcorpora, including different genres (story vs. conversation) and different registers (speech addressed to adult vs. peer), were developed to analyze the distribution of parts of speech. Finally, individual and within-group PoS Profiles were built. Statistical analysis revealed some significant differences in the PoS Profile between the genres and communication registers. Namely, the genre had a significant impact on the frequency of nouns, verbs, adverbs, particles, conjunctions, and prepositions, while the communication register impacted significantly on the frequency of nouns, pronouns, adverbs, particles, and conjunctions. In the paper, the dynamic model of speech production is further discussed. Results of the study inspire discussion on the role of the PoS Profile as a manifestation of the concurrent relations between the child’s language competence and cognitive resources.

General Information

Keywords: discourse, genre, communication register, child language, part of speech

Journal rubric: Psycholinguistics

Article type: scientific article

DOI: https://doi.org/10.17759/exppsy.2022150110

Funding. The reported study was funded by Russian Science Foundation (RSF), project number 18-18-00114.

Received: 19.08.2020

Accepted:

For citation: Kornev A.N., Balciuniene I. Acquisition of Discourse at 4—5 Years of Age: Functional Dynamic Analysis of the Impact of Genre and Register on the Part-of-Speech Profile. Eksperimental'naâ psihologiâ = Experimental Psychology (Russia), 2022. Vol. 15, no. 1, pp. 160–176. DOI: 10.17759/exppsy.2022150110. (In Russ., аbstr. in Engl.)

References

  1. Anisimova T.V., Gimpelson E.G. Sovremennaja delovaja ritorika = Contemporary Business Discourse. SPb.: MODJeK, 2002. (In Russ.).
  2. Arutyunova N.D. Diskurs [Tekst] [Dicourse [Text]]. In N.D. Arutjunova. Lingvisticheskij enciklopedicheskij slovarj = Linguistic Encyclopedic Thesaurus. M.: Sovetskaja enciklopedija, 1990. (In Russ.).
  3. Balčiūnienė I., Kornev A.N. Osobennosti ustnogo diskursa u detej 4—5 let: aprobacija novogo metoda poluchenija korpusnyh dannyh [Spoken discourse in the 4-5-year ages: Piloting the new method for corpus data collecting]. Vosmoj mezhdisciplinarnyj seminar «Analiz razgovornoj russkoj rechi» (AR3-2019) = The 8th Interdisciplinary Seminar ‘Analysis of the Spoken Russian’ (AR3-2019). SPb.: Izd-vo SPbGU, 2019, pp. 31—38. (In Russ.).
  4. Bakhtin M.M. Problema rechevyh zhanrov [The issue of speech genres]. In M.M. Bahtin. Sobranie sochinenij. T. 5.: raboty 1940—1960 gg. = Selected Papers. Vol. 5. Papers from the 1940—1960 years. M.: Russkie slovari, 1996. (In Russ.).
  5. Boeva-Omelechko N.B., Kisil A.K. Registr kak situativnyj variant jazyka [Register as the situative linguistic version]. Izvestija Juzhnogo federaljnogo universiteta. Filologicheskie nauki = Izvestia. Ural Federal University Journal. Series 2. Humanities and Arts. 2016. Vol. 4, pp. 93—101. (In Russ.).
  6. Vygotsky L.S. Razvitie vysshih psihicheskih funkcij: Sobr. soch. T. 3. = Development of the Higher Mental Functions: Selected Papers. Vol. 3. M., 1983. (In Russ.).
  7. Gvozdev A.N. Voprosy izuchenija detskoj rechi = Issues in Child Language Studies. SPb.: «Detstvo-Press», 2007. (In Russ.).
  8. Gvozdev A.N. Formirovanie u rebenka grammaticheskogo stroja russkogo jazyka = Acquisition of Russian Grammar. M.: Akad. pedag. nauk RSFSR, 1949. (In Russ.).
  9. Eliseeva M.B. Stanovlenie individual’noj yazykovoj sistemy rebenka = Development of the Individual System of Language. Moskva: Yazyki slavyanskoj kuljtury, 2014. (In Russ.).
  10. Eliseeva M.B. Foneticheskoe i leksicheskoe razvitie rebenka rannego vozrasta = Phonetical and Lexical Development in the Early Childhood. SPb.: Izd-vo RGPU, 2008. (In Russ.).
  11. Kornev A.N. Osnovy logopatologii detskogo vozrasta: klinicheskie i psihologicheskie aspekty = Handbook on the Child Logopathology: Clinical and Psychological Perspectives. SPb.: Rechj, 2006. (In Russ.).
  12. Kornev A.N., Balčiūnienė I. Sopostavitel’noe issledovanie grammaticheskogo chastotnogo profilja v russkom i litovskom diskurse u detej 6 let [Comparative analysis of the Part-of-Speech Profile in Russian and Lithuanian discourse of the 6-year ages]. Acta Linguistica Petropolitana. 2017. Vol. 13. No. 3, pp. 789—810. (In Russ.).
  13. Kornev A.N., Balčiūnienė I., Voeykova M.D., Ivanova K.A., Yagunova E.V. Analiz grammaticheskogo chastotnogo profilja leksem korpusa detskoj rechi kak metod izuchenija razvitija rechi v norme i pri pervichnom nedorazvitii rechi u doshkoljnikov [Analysis of the Part-of-Speech Profile as a method for studies in typical and impaired language development in the preschool-age children]. Novye informacionnye tehnologii v avtomatizirovannyh sistemah-2016 = The New IT in the Automatized Systems-2016. M.: Moscow Institute for Electronics and Mathematics, 2016, pp. 33—38. (In Russ.).
  14. Paducheva E.V. Diskursivnye slova i kategorii: rezhimy interpretacii [Discoursive words and categories: Possible speculations]. In V.A. Plungian, V.Yu. Gusev, A.Yu. Urmanchieva. Issledovanija po teorii grammatiki. Vyp. 4: Grammaticheskie kategorii v diskurse = Studies in Grammar Theory. Vol. 4: Grammatical Categories in Discourse. M.: Gnozis, 2008, pp. 56—86. (In Russ.).
  15. Plungian V.A. Predislovie: Diskurs i grammatika [Introduction: Discourse and grammar]. In V.A. Plungian, V.Yu. Gusev, A.Yu. Urmanchieva. Issledovanija po teorii grammatiki. Vyp. 4: Grammaticheskie kategorii v diskurse = Studies in Grammar Theory. Vol. 4: Grammatical Categories in Discourse. M.: Gnozis, 2008, pp. 7—34. (In Russ.).
  16. Sedov K.F. Diskurs i lichnostj = Discourse and Personality. M.: Labirint, 2004. (In Russ.).
  17. Sternin I.A. Russkij rechevoj etiket = Russian Linguistic etiquette. Voronezh, 1996. (In Russ.).
  18. Ceytlin S.N. (ed.) Rechj rebenka: rannie etapy = Child Speech: The Early Stages. SPb.: Izd-vo RGPU, 2000. (In Russ.).
  19. Ceytlin S.N. Ocherki po slovoobrazovaniju i formoobrazovaniju v detskoj rechi = Papers on Derivation in Child Language. M.: Znak, 2009. (In Russ.).
  20. Allen M.S., Kertoy M.K., Sherblom J.C., Pettit J.M. Children’s narrative productions: A comparison of personal event and fictional stories. Applied Psycholinguistics. 1994. Vol. 15. No. 2, pp. 149—176.
  21. Balčiūnienė I., Kornev A.N. Evaluation of narrative skills in language-impaired children: Advantages of a dynamic approach. In E. Aguilar-Mediavilla, L. Buil-Legaz, R. López-Penadés, V.A. Sanchez-Azanza, D. Adrover-Roig. Atypical Language Development in Romance Languages. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company, 2019, pp. 127—141.
  22. Bamberg M., Moissinac L. Discourse development. In A.C. Graesser, M.A. Gernsbacher, S.R. Goldman. Handbook of Discourse Processes. Mahwah NJ, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers, 2003, pp. 395—437.
  23. Bassano D., Maillochon I., Eme E. Developmental changes, and variability in the early lexicon: a study of French children‘s naturalistic productions. Journal of Child Language. 1998. Vol. 25, pp. 493—531.
  24. Berman R., Slobin D.I. Relating Events in Narrative. A Crosslinguistic Developmental Study. London, NY: Routledge, 1994.
  25. Biber D., Conrad S. Register variation: A corpus approach. In D. Schiffrin, D. Tannen, H.E. Hamilton. The Handbook of Discourse Analysis. Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2001, pp. 175—196.
  26. Braine D.S., Bowerman M. Children’s first word combinations. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development. 1976. Vol. 41, No.1, pp. 1—104.
  27. Bruner J. Actual Minds, Possible Worlds. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1986.
  28. Bruner J. The narrative construction of reality. Critical Inquiry. 1991. Vol. 18, pp. 1—21.
  29. Cook-Gumperz J., Kyratzis A. Child Discourse. In D. Schiffrin, D. Tannen, H.E. Hamilton. The Handbook of Discourse Analysis. Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2001, pp. 590—611.
  30. Eisenberg A. Learning to describe past experiences in conversation. Discourse Processes. 1985. Vol. 8, pp. 177—204.
  31. Ervin Tripp S.M., Küntay A. The occasioning and structure of conversational stories. In T. Givon. Conversation: Cognitive, Communicative and Social Perspectives. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing, 1997, pp. 33—166.
  32. Furman R., Özyürek A. Development of interactional discourse markers: Insights from Turkish children’s and adults’ oral narratives. Journal of Pragmatics. 2007. Vol. 39. No. 10, pp. 1742—1757.
  33. Halliday M.A.K. Learning How to Mean — Explorations in the Development of Language. London: Edward Arnold Ltd, 1975.
  34. Halliday M.A.K., Hasan R. Cohesion in English. London: Longman Group Limited, 1976.
  35. Hudson J.A., Shapiro L.R. Children’s scripts, stories and personal narratives. A. In McCabe, C. Peterson. Developing Narrative Structure. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 1991, pp. 89—136.
  36. Hughes D.L., McGillivray L., Schmidek M. Guide to Narrative Language: Procedures for Assessment. Austin, TX: Pro-Ed, 1997.
  37. Johnstone B. Discourse analysis and narrative. In D. Schiffrin, D. Tannen, H.E. Hamilton. The Handbook of Discourse Analysis. Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2001, pp. 635—649.
  38. Kornev A.N., Balčiūnienė I. Fictional narrative as a window to discourse development: A psycholinguistic approach. In J. Badio. Events and Narratives in Language. Frankfurt am Main, Bern, Bruxelles, New York, Oxford, Warszawa, Wien: Peter Lang Publishing, 2017, pp. 171—188.
  39. Kyratzis A., Ervin-Tripp S.M. The development of discourse markers in peer interaction. Journal of Pragmatics. 1999. Vol. 31, pp. 1321—1338.
  40. Le Normand M.T., Moreno‐Torres I., Parisse C., Dellatolas G. How do children acquire early grammar and build multiword utterances? A corpus study of French children aged 2 to 4. Child Development. 2013. Vol. 84. No. 2, pp. 647—661.
  41. Le Normand M.T., Parisse Ch., Cohen H. Lexical diversity and productivity in French preschoolers: developmental, gender and sociocultural factors. Clinical Linguistics & Phonetics. 2008. Vol. 22. No. 1, pp. 47—58.
  42. MacWhinney B. The CHILDES Project: Tools for Analyzing Talk. Electronic Edition. 2010. http://childes.psy.cmu.edu/manuals/CLAN.pdf
  43. McCabe A., Bliss L.S. Patterns of Narrative Discourse. A Multicultural, Lifespan Approach. Boston, 2003.
  44. McCabe A., Rollins P.R. Assessment of preschool narrative skills. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology. 1994. Vol. 3, pp. 45—56.
  45. Miller P., Sperry L. Early talk about the past: the origins of conversational stories of personal experience. Journal of Child Language. 1988. Vol. 15, pp. 293—315.
  46. Nelson K. 1996. Language in Cognitive Development. The Emergence of the Mediated Mind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  47. Pan B.A., Berko-Gleason J. Semantic development: learning the meanings of words. In J. Berko-Gleason. The Development of Language. Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 1997, pp. 122—158.
  48. Peterson C., McCabe A. High point analysis. In C. Peterson, A. McCabe. Developmental Psycholinguistics: Three Ways of Looking at a Child’s Narrative. New York: Plenum, 1983, pp. 29—245.
  49. Read B.K., Cherry L.J. Preschool children‘s production of directive forms. Discourse Processes. 1978. Vol. 1. No. 3, pp. 233—245.
  50. Schiffrin D. Discourse markers: Language, meaning, and context. In D. Schiffrin, D. Tannen, H.E. Hamilton. The Handbook of Discourse Analysis. Blackwell Publishing Ltd, 2001, pp. 54—75.
  51. Slobin D.I. Learning to think for speaking: Native language, cognition, and rhetorical style. Pragmatics. 1991. Vol. 1, pp. 7—26.
  52. Sprott R.A. Children‘s use of discourse markers in disputes: Form‐function relations and discourse in child language. Discourse Processes. 1992. Vol. 15. No. 4, pp. 423—439.
  53. Steffensen M.S. Register, Cohesion, and Cross-cultural Reading Comprehension. Tech. Rep. No. 220. Urbana: University of Illinois, Centre for the Study of Reading, 1981.
  54. Strawson P.F. Identifying reference and truth-values. In D.D. Steinberg, L.A. Jakobovits. Semantics: An Interdisciplinary Reader in Philosophy, Linguistics and Psychology. Cambridge: The University Press, 1971, pp. 86—99.
  55. Tomasello M. Origins of Human Communication. The MIT Press, 2008.
  56. Wagner C.R., Nettelbladt U., Sahlén B., Nilholm C. Conversation versus narration in pre-school children with language impairment. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders. 2000. Vol. 35. No. 1, pp. 83—93.
  57. Westerveld M.F., Vidler K. Spoken language samples of Australian children in conversation, narration and exposition. International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology. 2016. Vol. 18. No. 3, pp. 288—298.

Information About the Authors

Alexander N. Kornev, Doctor of Psychology, PhD in Medicine, Professor, Head of the Department of Logopathology, Head of the Laboratory of Neurocognitive Technologies, Saint Petersburg State Academy of Pediatric Medicine, Teacher at the Institute of Practical Psychology "Imaton", St.Petersburg, Russia, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6406-1238, e-mail: k1949@yandex.ru

Ingrida Balciuniene, PhD, Associated Professor, Department of Logopathology, Saint Petersburg State Pediatric Medical University, Associated Professor, Department of Logopathology, , St.Petersburg, Russia, ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8307-1108, e-mail: ingrimi@gmail.com

Metrics

Views

Total: 456
Previous month: 17
Current month: 0

Downloads

Total: 204
Previous month: 2
Current month: 1