Unraveling the Nature of Children’s Self-directed Speech: Correlates of Five- and Six-year-olds’ Overt and Partially Covert Speech on Three Tasks

Abstract

Young children’s self-directed speech during activities has long fascinated developmental psychologists. Why do children talk to themselves and does it support development? On Vygotsky’s sociocultural account, children use self-directed speech to regulate thought and behavior while performing challenging tasks, and this speech has a specific developmental trajectory—from overt (i.e., talking at full volume) to partially covert (i.e., whispering or mumbling), before finally becoming fully covert (i.e., inner speech or thought). Many published empirical findings are consistent with this account; however, task-relevant self-directed speech does not always relate to task performance. The reported study aimed to gain insight into why by exploring, in a sample of five and six-year-old children (n = 86), task-relevant overt and partially-covert speech on three tasks, and relations with task performance as well as child and task characteristics. Trial-level multinomial models were used, allowing us to model trial number and task demands that varied by trial. Both overt and partially-covert speech were observed on all tasks, with most children using at least one of these forms of speech some of the time. Relations between self-directed speech and performance varied across tasks, showing positive, null, or negative associations. Self-directed speech varied depending on the demands of the task on a given trial. Overt speech, but not partially covert speech, was related to a parent-report measure of child talkativeness as well as social speech during the task. Age was not consistently related to self-directed speech on the tasks. Together, these findings challenge the notion that overt speech is best understood simply as a transition to partially covert and then fully covert speech. Rather, whether speech is overt (vs. partially or fully covert) may be determined by social goals. More research with a wider variety of tasks is needed to better understand the nature of these two forms of self-directed speech.