The toddler's speech in play

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine speech output in toddlers at five levels of task difficulty. It was predicted, on the basis of the assumption that speech and problem solving pull from the same fixed energy pool, that during periods of higher cognitive demand speech would decrease.;Twenty toddlers between the ages of 23 months 23 days and 27 months 13 days were videotaped in their homes solving five highly engaging jigsaw puzzles of increasing difficulty. Cognitive effort was defined by level of difficulty (1-5) and by puzzle solving behavior (preparation, placement, demonstration and disengagement). Behavior was analyzed according to level of engagement (Engaged and Focused, Engaged and Non-Focused, Unengaged). Speech was described in terms of Speech Ratio (Speech/Speech + No Speech) and Ratio of Task Relevant Speech (Relevant Utterances/Relevant Utterances + Irrelevant Utterances). A final analysis was done to determine the interaction of speech or no speech with success or failure of placement attempt.;Videotapes were analyzed at 2-second time points (+/{dollar}-{dollar}.01 sec) by entering codes for speech or no speech, puzzle solving behavior, level of focus and level of task relevancy, as well as for success or failure of placement attempt.;The results indicated that, (a) the proportion of speech increased with task difficulty, but did not vary with puzzle solving behaviors, (b) the proportion of task relevant utterances was greater during problem solving behaviors than during disengagement, but did not vary significantly by level of difficulty, and (c) the presence of speech was more likely to be associated with failure than with success.;These findings support the view that available cognitive energy is subject to arousal. It was concluded that the highly motivating tasks contributed to arousal, as did an expectancy set for success. The resulting increase in available resources was spent quantitatively by the toddler (in more speech output), rather than qualitatively (in more relevant speech or higher levels of success).