PRESCHOOL CHILDRENS INTRA-CONVERSATIONAL NARRATIVES

Analysis of narratives produced spontaneously within natural conversation by children from three to five years of age found age-related increases in length, number, variety, compression, and complexity of six story elements, remoteness of narrated events, and number and variety of intra- and post-narrative listener responses made to them. These and other changes indicate a considerable growth from three to five in the amount and sophistication of information furnished by preschool narrators, particularly between three and four years, as well as in the motivation of the stories with respect to the overall conversational discourse. © 1979, Cambridge University Press. All rights reserved.