A Study of the Form and Content of Private Speech Produced by Iranian Adult EFL Learners

Abstract

This article examines the speech of Persian learners of English while working collaboratively on a picture description task. The main purpose of the study was to analyze the content and form of private speech identified in the interactions of 12 adult EFL learners at two beginner and advanced levels of proficiency. The learners’ interactions were tape-recorded during the completion of a picture description task. The results indicated that whisper and loud forms of private speech were used by both advanced and beginner learners, and question/answer and repetition were the two most frequent contents of private speech identified in the transcripts of both groups. Extracts obtained from the interactions of the learners suggest that private speech helped them manage their speech, structure their sentences and get control over the task.