Referent Mention When Parents Tell a Story: A Means to Explain Children's Referential Uses in Narratives

Abstract

This study aims to describe parents’ referential choices while recounting a story to their child. Indeed, in choosing referring expressions (REs), until the 8 years of age or even later, children are less sensitive to discourse accessibility than factors such as visual accessibility or characters’ status within the story. In this study, 24 parents’ narratives co-constructed with their child (mean age: 6;06) from a textless picture book were video-recorded. REs were coded according to their form (pronouns, NP) and their position in the referential chain (introduction, maintaining, switching). Referents’ status (main or secondary character) and the level of competition according to the number of referents in the pictures for each narrative sequence were also described. Analyses compared REs distribution across position in the referential chain, character's status, and competition level in order to investigate which factors influenced the choice of REs. Results showed that parents’ referential choices are more influenced by referents’ status and visual competition between referents than the position in the referential chain. This could account for the developmental trajectory of reference management in children.