Relationships between collaborative narrative production and metaplay communication in social play of hearing-impaired children

Abstract

This study analyzed relationships between collaborative narrative production and metaplay communication in the social play of 6 hearing-impaired children 6 years of age whose average hearing level was 71.6 dB (48.7-92.5 dB, 1 SD 19.4) as compared to that of 6 hearing preschoolers in the 3-4 years age range. The results revealed that the hearingimpaired subjects were more likely than the hearing subjects to delay in collaborative narrative production in which participants share themes and co-construct scenarios foreseeing developments. Collaborative narrative production was influenced more by metaplay communication than by the voice of the character played. The hearing-impaired subjects used metaplay communication less than the hearing subjects, but the mean length of utterance (MLU) in morphemes of metaplay indicated an equivalent level in both subject groups. Hearing-impaired subjects might have difficulty in understanding a panoramic view of a play storyline that changes from moment to moment because they have a problem sharing and communicating play themes. Therefore, metaplay communication of hearingimpaired subjects was inferred to be less advanced than expected from the length of utterance. These results suggest that metaplay communication is important language behavior which can construct narratives using meta cognition related to human behavior.