We often talk to ourselves. This spontaneous
speech of this is referred to as private speech. Private
speech is speech, which serves no communicative function.
It is part of normal early childhood development and
tends to disappear peak around age eight and to disappear
by around age ten. Researchers realized that this private
speech often served to help individuals perform tasks.
These researchers utilized this phenomenon as an intervention
called self-instruction in which individuals are literally
taught to “talk themselves” through a task.
Self-instruction uses induced self-statements. Self-instruction
serves many purposes. It may aid in orienting, organizing,
and/or structuring behavior. Children will use private
speech to consciously understand or focus on a problem
or situation and to overcome difficulties. The goal
of self-instruction is to go from modeled, induced,
strategic, task-relevant, private speech to covert,
strategic, task-relevant, private speech.
