Private Speech in Illiterate Adults: Cognitive Functions, Task Difficulty, and Literacy

Abstract

Children's private speech has been widely studied among children, but it is clear that adults use private speech as well. In this study, illiterate adults' private speech during a ''school-like'' task was explored as a function of literacy level and task difficulty in a sample of 126 adults enrolled in a public literacy program. A main effect for literacy level was found-private speech was more internalized and less externalized among adults with higher literacy levels. Externalized private speech was more frequently observed among illiterate adults engaged in the most difficult task. Private speech served cognitive functions as indicated by the proportion of self-regulatory private speech and the proportion of private speech preceding actions being higher in the advanced literacy group and among illiterate adults doing the easier task. Internalized private speech, self-regulatory private speech, and private speech preceding action were each positively correlated with performance and negatively correlated with time to complete the task. The use of private speech in illiterate adults appears to be linked to the mastery of cultural experiences, such as literacy, similar to the selftalk of children.

Inner speech: Development, cognitive functions, phenomenology, and neurobiology.

“… Lidstone et al (2012) proposed that, if inner speech use is related to earlier communicative development, children with an SLI may be expected to demonstrate delay or deviation in their inner speech skills. In line with the evidence of private speech use in adults with literacy problems ( Alarcón-Rubio, Sánchez-Medina, & Winsler, 2013 ), children with an SLI showed normal effects of articulatory suppression on a towers task, but evidenced less internalized forms of private speech while attempting the task. Lidstone and colleagues interpreted their results as an example of delayed inner speech internalization, rather than a qualitative difference in verbal strategy use.…”

“…A final group of interest in this regard is adults who for various reasons have poor language skills. Alarcón-Rubio, Sánchez-Medina, and Winsler (2013) studied private speech use in illiterate adults, in comparison with those with high literacy, when engaging with a categorization task. Compared with high-literacy participants, participants with low literacy displayed much more externalized private speech, particularly on more difficult forms of the task.…”

Habla Privada y resolución de problemas en adolescentes de 15 años

“…Nuestros resultados son consistentes con los de Alarcón-Rubio et al (2013), que utilizaron una tarea semántica. Para futuras investigaciones, resulta interesante realizar un estudio que compare la relación HP-desempeño en una tarea viso-espacial y en una tarea semántica con el fin de explorar con mayor profundidad la influencia de las tareas.…”

“…Otro motivo por el que el HP no es socialmente aceptada es que las personas pueden asociarla con signos de psicopatología (Duncan & Tarulli, 2009) A pesar del desarrollo curvilineal del HP, su presencia en adolescentes y adultos es consistente con el planteo socio-cultural, ya que el mismo Vygotski (2000) establece como condición de aparición una perturbación del curso normal de la actividad, en "la aparición de las dificultades entran en juego los medios auxiliares; esta es la regla general que podemos deducir de todos nuestros experimentos" (p. 241). Entonces la presencia de HP resurge luego de ser interiorizada en momentos de alta demanda cognitiva, frente a la necesidad de completar una tarea difícil o nueva, independientemente del momento evolutivo (Alarcón-Rubio, Sánchez-Medina, & Winsler, 2013).…”

“…Alarcón- Rubio et al (2013) realizaron un estudio con adultos que asistían a un programa de alfabetización, aplicando una tarea semántica de clasificación de objetos.…”