School of Education Science, AnShun University, Anshun, China.
J Psycholinguist Res. 2023 Dec;52(6):2453-2472. doi: 10.1007/s10936-023-10007-y. Epub 2023 Sep 1.
The aim of this research was to explore the progression of narrative macro-structure in Chinese children between the ages of 3 and 6 in preschool. To investigate the narratives of young children in a Chinese prefecture-level city kindergarten, the study selected the wordless picture book "Frog, Where Are You?" as their material. They employed the story grammar analysis method and examined the storytelling of 41 preschoolers (aged 3-4), 47 preschoolers (aged 4-5), and 66 preschoolers (aged 5-6). Significant disparities were observed among age groups in terms of both the total score for story grammar ability and the specific indicators associated with story grammar ability scores, as highlighted by the study. Notably, substantial variances were observed in the total story grammar ability score between children aged 3-4 and 4-5, between children aged 4-5 and 5-6, and between children aged 3-4 and 5-6, as evidenced by p-values of 0.000. Furthermore, substantial dissimilarities were evident in the specific indicators of story grammar ability scores, encompassing "story background, story cause, attempt, and story results," when comparing children aged 3-4 years with those aged 4-5 years (p-values of 0.001, 0.000, 0.025, and 0.008, correspondingly). Moreover, significant differences were identified between children aged 4-5 years and children aged 5-6 years (all p-values of 0.000). However, there were no significant differences in the "internal response" indicator between different age groups (p-value of 0.777 > 0.05). The study found that Chinese preschoolers' narrative macrostructure development showed extremely strong age effects, and their narrative macrostructure ability increased with age. Furthermore, the study identified that the development of narrative macrostructure in Chinese preschoolers may be related to their own cause-and-effect logical reasoning abilities.
本研究旨在探讨学前儿童汉语叙事宏观结构的发展进程。为了研究中国地级市幼儿园中幼儿的叙事情况，本研究选择了无字图画书《青蛙弗洛格找春天》作为研究材料。研究采用故事语法分析法，对 41 名 3-4 岁、47 名 4-5 岁和 66 名 5-6 岁的学前儿童进行了故事讲述测试。研究结果表明，年龄组间在故事语法能力总分和故事语法能力得分的具体指标上存在显著差异。特别是，3-4 岁和 4-5 岁、4-5 岁和 5-6 岁、3-4 岁和 5-6 岁儿童的总故事语法能力得分差异显著，p 值均为 0.000。此外，在故事语法能力得分的具体指标中，3-4 岁与 4-5 岁儿童在“故事背景、故事起因、尝试和故事结果”方面存在显著差异，p 值分别为 0.001、0.000、0.025 和 0.008。同时，4-5 岁与 5-6 岁儿童在各指标上均存在显著差异（p 值均为 0.000）。然而，不同年龄组间的“内部反应”指标差异不显著（p 值为 0.777>0.05）。本研究发现，中国学前儿童叙事宏观结构的发展具有极强的年龄效应，其叙事宏观结构能力随年龄增长而提高。此外，研究还发现，中国学前儿童叙事宏观结构的发展可能与其自身的因果逻辑推理能力有关。
