creators_name: Morin, Alain
type: journalp
datestamp: 2002-10-28
lastmod: 2011-03-11 08:55:05
metadata_visibility: show
title: Self-awareness and "introspective" private speech in 6-year-old children.
ispublished: pub
subjects: cog-psy
full_text_status: public
abstract: It has been suggested recently that self-awareness is cognitively mediated by inner speech and that this hypothesis could be tested by using the private speech paradigm, This paper describes a study in which the creation of a state of self-awareness was attempted in children to test the viability of a research strategy based on private speech and used to explore the hypothesis of a link
between self-awareness and inner speech, and to test directly this hypothesis by comparing the incidence of private speech in self-aware and control conditions. 32 children were asked to evaluate the attractiveness of pictures when in front of a mirror (a widely used self-focusing stimulus) and with no mirror. Reliably more favorable ratings of the images were predicted presuming intensification of affects in self-awareness. Private speech was recorded, with the prediction of a more important incidence of "introspective" self-verbalizations (for example, "Wow! I really like this picture!") in the self-aware condition. None of these outcomes were obtained.
Results are discussed in terms of previous attempts to manipulate self-awareness in children. It is suggested that the private speech paradigm does not appear to be a promising strategy when inner speech and self-awareness are considered
date: 1991
date_type: published
publication: Psychological Reports
volume: 68
pagerange: 1299-1306
refereed: TRUE
citation:   Morin, Alain  (1991) Self-awareness and "introspective" private speech in 6-year-old children.  [Journal (Paginated)]     
document_url: http://cogprints.org/2561/1/Privatespeech.pdf