Abstract
One of Vygotsky’s main insights was to highlight the role of linguistic signs in psychological development. In this paper, following the works carried out through the Object Pragmatics paradigm, which is grounded in Vygotsky’s cultural-historical and semiotic framework, we will explore non verbal signs addressed toward herself by the infant in the process of communication toward oneself, in relation to the appropriation of the objects’ canonical uses by infants at 8-, 12- and 16 months in triadic infant-object-adult interaction. More specifically, our focus will concern the development of self-directed ostensions. We will examine how this movement, under the impulse related to other’s people signs and public meanings of the object, endorse the status of sign during development and specifies itself in ostension. Ostension as a sign refers to a presentation of an object to someone and has been initially defined within the framework of communication toward other people in semiotic literature. In our works, this sign is studied in communication toward oneself and in its development. It should be noted that very few studies have been done on this topic. Following Vygotsky, we consider that turned toward oneself, ostension plays a crucial role in the formation of thought and consciousness (in the sense of awareness). This paper will focus on the social and semiotic conditions of production of this sign and, more precisely, on the role of the adult’s non verbal and verbal mediations, which aim to elicit and sustain its realisation by the infant.
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Notes
In this context, a distinction is carried out between consciousness and awareness. This distinction exists only in the English language, in comparison with the French language. Concerning consciousness before the advent of language, we argue in favour of an understanding of consciousness through the term of awareness, as we deem appropriate regarding our research.
The term of egocentric speech, which can be found in the works of Piaget (1926/1959), has been taken up by Vygotsky for the purpose of conferring another status to it. According to Vygotsky, egocentric speech would assert the ongoing interiorisation of language. This type of language would lead to inner speech and verbal thinking.
Our interest is based on the entire mediations realised by the adult, whether verbal, postural, gestural or related to the organisation of the situation.
It should be noted that criteria related to self-directed ostensions do not constitute the main focus in this article. For more information on this topic, see Moro et al. 2015.
The use of the software ELAN (Eudico Linguistic ANnotator, created by The Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, Netherlands) enabled us to annotate collected audio and video files.
A distant demonstration refers to a realisation of the use of object by the adult on her own body, in front of the infant (Moro and Rodríguez 2005).
A training cup can be understood in two ways: as a training cup used in everyday life or as a training cup toy. The spout of the everyday life training cup can be opened to put liquid inside, which is not the case regarding the training cup toy.
For more information about pretended uses, see Rodríguez et al. (2014).
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The authors wish to thank Anne Viscolo for reading the manuscript and providing helpful advices.
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The thesis of Virginie Dupertuis is directed by Professor Christiane Moro from the University of Lausanne and is entitled Communication toward oneself and use of object in early development.
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Dupertuis, V., Moro, C. Self-Directed Ostensions and Mediations of the Adult at the Age of 8-, 12- and 16 months. Integr. psych. behav. 50, 621–633 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12124-016-9350-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12124-016-9350-x