Children's Oral Narrative Skills Through the Lens of Internal State Terms: A Large-Scale Study of Fictional Stories Elicited With the Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives

PURPOSE: This article investigates the development of oral narrative skills in children through the lens of internal states in a large cross-linguistic data set of comparable fictional stories. METHOD: In a joint effort of research groups around the world, 5,507 picture-based stories were elicited from 2,763 monolingual and bilingual typically developing (TD) children aged 3-13 years in 32 countries across 44 languages with the Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives (MAIN; Gagarina et al., 2019). These were transcribed and coded for internal state terms (ISTs) that express story characters' thoughts, emotions, and perceptions. Using generalized mixed models, we investigated the likelihood of a child producing ISTs in the stories, as influenced by age, monolingualism versus bilingualism, and, for bilinguals, first language versus second language, elicitation mode (telling vs. retelling), IST type, story type, and story length. RESULTS: We found strong positive effects of age and elicitation mode (retelling) on IST production, but no differences between monolinguals and bilinguals or for bilinguals in their two languages. Children were far more likely to produce ISTs as initiating events than ISTs as reactions. Story length only predicted IST production in younger children, but not in older ones. CONCLUSIONS: As shown by this large-scale sample, children's skills in making explicit the internal states of characters in fictional stories develop substantially during the primary school years, across languages, and for both monolingual and bilingual learners. The robust facilitative effect of retelling suggests that retelling may be particularly suitable to use with MAIN when researchers/clinicians are interested in assessing a child's ability to verbalize internal states. Future research should examine ISTs in children with developmental disorders and explore their application in intervention. SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.33857551.

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Journal
Language Speech and Hearing Services in Schools
Published
2026-09-28
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1044/2026_lshss-25-00147
Primary Topic
Language Development and Disorders
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article
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article

Children's Oral Narrative Skills Through the Lens of Internal State Terms: A Large-Scale Study of Fictional Stories Elicited With the Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives

Kateryna Iefremenko, Wenchun Yang, Marta Białecka, Theodoros Marinis et al.
Language Speech and Hearing Services in Schools
Language Development and Disorders
article

Children's Oral Narrative Skills Through the Lens of Internal State Terms: A Large-Scale Study of Fictional Stories Elicited With the Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives

Kateryna Iefremenko, Wenchun Yang, Marta Białecka, Theodoros Marinis, Alondra Camus Torres, Gordana Hržica, Uma Maheshwari Chimirala, Tessel Boerma, Ineta Dabašinskienė, Angel Chan, Natalia Vladimirovna Gagarina, Josefin Lindgren, Madhavi Gayathri Raman, Joel Walters, Dato Abashidze, Carmit Altman, Manuel Bohn, Kathleen Kay Amora, Monika Janíková, Mariam Komeili, Reili Argus, Elena De Gaudio, Freideriki Tselekidou, Taina Välimaa, Nathalie Topaj, Abdijabbor Amanov, Maja Roch, Angelika Golegos, Sharon Armon-Lotem, Rowena Garcia, Alexandra Perovic, Секерина Ирина, Elisa Mattiauda, Elena Galkina, Dongsun Yim, Sari M. Kunnari, Ewa Haman, Celestino Oriikiriza, Sigal Uziel, Karolina Muszyńska, Kristine Marie Jensen de López, Mary-Pat O’Malley, Eleni Peristeri, Ιάνθη-Μαρία Τσιμπλή, Elma Blom, Ute Bohnacker, Svetlana Kapalková, Sveta Fichman, Sviatlana Karpava, Daleen Klop, Agnieszka Otwinowska, Markus Huff, Ali Talebi, Daria Alkhimchenkova, Andra Kütt-Leedis, Sun He, Alyona Sternharz, Stanislava Antonijevic, Jonas Maigaard, Madhavi Maganti, Gloria Nyarko, Vicky Chondrogianni, Qurbondin Alamshoev, Annelien Smith, Melina Aparici, Chiara Levorato
article en

Abstract

PURPOSE: This article investigates the development of oral narrative skills in children through the lens of internal states in a large cross-linguistic data set of comparable fictional stories. METHOD: In a joint effort of research groups around the world, 5,507 picture-based stories were elicited from 2,763 monolingual and bilingual typically developing (TD) children aged 3-13 years in 32 countries across 44 languages with the Multilingual Assessment Instrument for Narratives (MAIN; Gagarina et al., 2019). These were transcribed and coded for internal state terms (ISTs) that express story characters' thoughts, emotions, and perceptions. Using generalized mixed models, we investigated the likelihood of a child producing ISTs in the stories, as influenced by age, monolingualism versus bilingualism, and, for bilinguals, first language versus second language, elicitation mode (telling vs. retelling), IST type, story type, and story length. RESULTS: We found strong positive effects of age and elicitation mode (retelling) on IST production, but no differences between monolinguals and bilinguals or for bilinguals in their two languages. Children were far more likely to produce ISTs as initiating events than ISTs as reactions. Story length only predicted IST production in younger children, but not in older ones. CONCLUSIONS: As shown by this large-scale sample, children's skills in making explicit the internal states of characters in fictional stories develop substantially during the primary school years, across languages, and for both monolingual and bilingual learners. The robust facilitative effect of retelling suggests that retelling may be particularly suitable to use with MAIN when researchers/clinicians are interested in assessing a child's ability to verbalize internal states. Future research should examine ISTs in children with developmental disorders and explore their application in intervention. SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL: https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.33857551.

Language Speech and Hearing Services in Schools
Leuphana University of Lüneburg (DE), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (ES), Uppsala University (SE), Åbo Akademi University (FI), University of Padua (IT), Ewha Womans University (KR), Bar-Ilan University (IL), College of Staten Island (US), Hong Kong Polytechnic University (HK), Kazakh-British Technical University (KZ), Nanyang Technological University (SG), City University of New York (US), University of Zagreb (HR), Vytautas Magnus University (LT), University of Konstanz (DE), Tallinn University (EE), Truman State University (US), Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Tajikistan (TJ), University of Zurich (CH), Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (GR), University of Cambridge (GB), Stellenbosch University (ZA), Nalsar University of Law (IN), Nicolaus Copernicus University (PL), English and Foreign Languages University (IN), University of Saskatchewan (CA), University of Cyprus (CY), Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (DE), Kyrgyz State National University (KG), Tajik Agrarian University Shirinsho Shotemur (TJ), Leibniz-Institut für Wissensmedien (DE), Leibniz-Centre General Linguistics (DE), Heartspring (US), Krea University, University College London (GB), University of Warsaw (PL), University of the Philippines Manila (PH), Makerere University (UG), Achva Academic College (IL), Comenius University Bratislava (SK), Hungarian Academy of Sciences (HU), HUN-REN Research Centre for Natural Sciences (HU), University of Tübingen (DE), Sapienza University of Rome (IT), Xi'an Jiaotong University (CN), Aalborg University (DK), University of Edinburgh (GB)
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Language Development and Disorders
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