Resumo

FLOREZ-ROMERO, RITA; TORRADO-PACHECO, MARÍA CRISTINA  e  MESA, CAROL MAGNOLIA. THE EMERGENCE OF METALINGUISTIC ABILITIES. rev.latinoam.psicol. [online]. 2006, vol.38, n.3, pp.457-475. ISSN 0120-0534.

The goal in this research was to explore the emergence of metalinguistic capability in three groups: normal, institutionalized and with intellectual lacks. All of their members are from three to four years old in linguistic age. Thirty-six children, 18 girls and 18 boys, participated and they were taken from five institutions, two regular education schools, two social welfare institutions and one special education institute. A story titled El pinguino Piti y la ballena (The penguin Piti and the whale), composed by fifteen scenes, was designed as a methodological device. A scriptguided conversational strategy was used to obtain metalinguistic verbal production in children; their verbal responses were registered and analyzed from videtaped conversations. Results showed that typical and institutionalized children groups have a better metalinguistic performance compared with intelligence handicapped children, despite having a similar linguistic age. Data analysis endorsed the narrow relationship between metalinguistic capability and a general cognitive domain. Concerning the methodological device, it was shown that it has some drawbacks to obtain evidence on children metalinguistic abilities although it promotes a wide linguistic production. In spite of obstacles created by the experimental situation used to get the analyzed corpus, there were found evidence on metalinguistic abilities emergence at the third year of linguistic age.

Palavras-chave : emergency; metalinguistic capability; communicative interaction; cognitive development.

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