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date: 30 July 2021

Abstract and Keywords

This chapter traces the development of communicative intention, conversation, and narrative in early interaction from infancy to early childhood. True communicative intention commences once the infant acquires the social cognitive ability to share attention and intention with another. The developing child’s pragmatic understanding is reflective of his/her underlying motivations for cooperation and shared intentionality. As children begin to understand others’ mental states, they can take others’ perspectives and understand what knowledge is shared and with whom, moving from joint perceptual focus to more decontextualized communicative intentions. With adult assistance, the young child is able to engage in increasingly more sophisticated conversational exchanges and co-constructed narratives which influence the child’s autonomous capabilities.

Keywords: developmental pragmatics, communicative intention, shared intention, conversation, narrative

Pamela Rosenthal Rollins

Pamela R. Rollins is Associate Professor of Communication Disorders at the Callier Center for Communication Disorders, the University of Texas Dallas. Her early research focused on the development of tools to understand pragmatic development in typical children. She used these tools to define learning and communication processes associated with acquisition of social communication and language in typically developing children and children with ASD. Currently her research focus is on developing and evaluating interventions for children at risk for and diagnosed with ASD, and defining learning and communication processes associated with ASD. Professor Rollins works with a robotics designer to create a Robots4Autism social skills curriculum. She is conducting research to understand the effects of robots on social interaction and communication in children with ASD.

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