Stages and transitions in children’s semiotic development

Författare

Jordan Zlatev
Mats Andrén

Redaktör

Jordan Zlatev
Mats Andrén
Carita Lundmark
Marlene Johansson

Summary, in English

Stage models were prevalent in developmental psychology in

the past, but have recently been subjected to much criticism. We propose

“rehabilitation”, defining semiotic stage as a (not necessarily stable) period

characterized by the clear establishment of a novel semiotic capacity,

which may “dominate” the communication of the child at this stage, but

does not replace capacities from previous stages. This is spelled out by

adopting one particular model of semiotic development – the Mimesis

Hierarchy (Zlatev 2008a, 2008b) – and presenting comparative and

developmental data from 6 children in Sweden and Thailand, between 18

and 27 months of age, analyzing their acts of bodily communication

(ABCs) in relation to their emerging linguistic capacities. The results show

evidence for a transition around 20 months, when children display the use

of (stable) signs, shared with their community, in both the linguistic and

gestural modalities, but do not yet systematically combine them. Only

towards the end of the period under study does this begin to occur on a

more routine basis. Implications are drawn for the continuous debate “insight” vs. gradual development in ontogeny, suggesting a compromise.

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