The pragmatic function of children's questions.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the pragmatic function of preschool children's spontaneously produced questions. Twenty-four normal children between the age of 2 and 5 years were observed in a variety of situations at their day-care centers. Questions produced during these observation periods were categorized by pragmatic function. The three functional categories were information seeking, conversational, and directive. The distribution of the questions among the three pragmatic functions differed with age. The major function of the questions produced by the 2- and 3-year-old subjects was clearly information seeking, but the 4- and 5-year-olds' questions were more evenly distributed among the functional categories. The 4-year-olds used a high percentage of conversational questions in comparison to the other age groups. The children's question use appeared to follow the principle of using new forms for old functions and old forms for new functions.