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5 - Evaluation in Spanish-Speaking Mother–Child Narratives: The Social and Sense-Making Function of Internal-State References

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2012

By
Camila Fernández  and
Gigliana Melzi
Edited by
Allyssa McCabe ,
Alison L. Bailey  and
Gigliana Melzi
Allyssa McCabe
Affiliation:
University of Massachusetts, Lowell
Alison L. Bailey
Affiliation:
University of California, Los Angeles
Gigliana Melzi
Affiliation:
New York University
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Summary

Key words: narrative, evaluation, internal states, mother–child conversations, theory-of-mind, social cognition, autobiographical memory, Spanish, Latino children.

ABSTRACT

Young children's sociocognitive skills, such as their understanding of others' feelings and their ability to explain human action in terms of beliefs, emotions, and intentions, has been associated with naturally occurring talk about internal states in everyday family interactions. The frequency with which children engage in conversations about internal states is related to various aspects of sociocognitive development, including emotion recognition, affective perspective-taking, and false-belief understanding. Various individual and contextual factors influence the language used between parents and children during daily family interactions. However, most studies to date have examined the use of internal-state language in English-speaking homes; thus, results might not be generalizable to other cultural groups. The current study addressed this gap in the literature by examining the manner in which Spanish-speaking Peruvian mothers discussed internal states with their preschooler in two narrative contexts: conversations about the personal past and storybook-sharing interactions. The conversations in these two contexts between 32 middle-class mothers and their preschool-aged children (i.e., ages 3 and 5) were analyzed for the frequency and patterns of use of internal-state references. Results show gender and age differences in the use of internal-state references only in the narrative-conversation context. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the theoretical and empirical links between children's narrative competence and their sociocognitive skills.

Type
Chapter
Information
Spanish-Language Narration and Literacy
Culture, Cognition, and Emotion
 , pp. 92 - 118
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2008

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