Descrizione del progetto
Studiare il modo in cui i bambini affrontano gli utilizzi non letterali del linguaggio
L’espressione e la comprensione delle intenzioni comunicative, note come abilità pragmatiche, sono alla base dell’utilizzo del linguaggio nonché della comprensione e dello sviluppo precoci. I bambini piccoli usano il linguaggio in modo creativo per esprimersi e raggiungere i propri strumenti, oltre che per comprendere le intenzioni degli altri. Tuttavia essi potrebbero mostrare, al tempo stesso, delle difficoltà nella comprensione degli utilizzi del linguaggio non letterale da parte degli altri. Il progetto DEVCOM, finanziato dall’UE, intende sviluppare una comprensione sul modo in cui si sviluppano le abilità comunicative dei bambini, le relative fasi, oltreché sul modo in cui il ragionamento pragmatico dei bambini con utilizzi non letterali venga influenzato dal loro apprendimento dei significati convenzionali delle parole. Saranno utilizzate metodologie innovative, che combinano parametri espliciti e impliciti, per evidenziare ciò che aiuta o disturba i bambini nel corretto utilizzo e nell’appropriata comprensione del linguaggio non letterale.
Obiettivo
Children are born communicators. A growing body of developmental evidence suggests that the cognitive abilities enabling the expression and comprehension of communicative intentions – so-called pragmatic abilities – which underlie language use and understanding, develop early. However, a puzzling feature of pragmatic development is young children’s difficulties with non-literal uses of language (e.g. “I love you so much I could eat you up!”). How can children be early experts at a range of pragmatically complex tasks requiring attention to speakers’ intentions, but act like ‘literal listeners’ in other contexts? The objective of DEVCOM is to provide an account of the stages and factors involved in children’s developing competence with non-literal uses of language. The project will investigate the novel hypothesis that children’s growing sensitivity to sense conventions, which determine the publicly accepted meaning of words in their language, impedes children’s pragmatic reasoning with non-literal uses in the pre-school years. The empirical data will be gleaned from experimental studies with typically developing children aged 2-7 years, focusing on lexical innovation, lexical modulation, and figurative language, each highlighting the interaction of pragmatic reasoning with sensitivity to sense conventions in a distinct way. Further, the project will investigate whether the persistent difficulties with non-literal uses faced by children with Autism Spectrum Disorder may be linked to the same source. The project will use a set of novel methodologies combining explicit and implicit measures, assuming that while children’s performance on explicit measures is liable to be affected by a growing sensitivity to sense conventions, implicit measures may be more revealing of their actual pragmatic abilities. The empirical results will provide input to a novel theoretical account of pragmatic development that resolves the developmental puzzle of non-literal uses of language.
Campo scientifico
Parole chiave
Programma(i)
Argomento(i)
Meccanismo di finanziamento
ERC-STG - Starting GrantIstituzione ospitante
0313 Oslo
Norvegia