CONVERSATIONAL BEHAVIORS OF MONOLINGUAL AND BILINGUAL CHILDREN: A STUDY ON EPISODES AND INITIATIONS

Authors : Fatma Hülya Özcan

Pages : 291-307

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Publication Date : 2017-10-31

Article Type : Research Paper

Abstract :Conversations shape social interactions and conversational rules shape understanding among the participants. Among these conversational rules, initiations, verbal or non-verbal, are one of the basic rules. Initiations are important in the sense that they signal where a certain stretch of discourse, in other words, episodes, starts and ends in long stretches of discourse. Each episode in a conversation continues the same topic and contributes to topical coherence. Therefore, applying conversational rules are important at all stages of language development since it will prevent communication breakdowns. In this study, the focus is on the type of episodes that take place in conversations and how episodes are initiated by both monolingual Turkish-speaking and bilingual Turkish-Danish-speaking children. For this purpose, group conversations of monolingual and bilingual children were analyzed in terms of episodes and how these episodes are initiated. The results show that conversational skills continues to develop at school age. Being a monolingual or bilingual also makes a difference in conversational skills.
Keywords : Conversational Skills, Episodes, Initiations, Monolingual, Bilingual