Strategies and Challenges in the Designing of an Instrument for a Child Linguistic Assessment

Abstract

The design of a stimulus to elicit data in children involves several challenges, which combine not only theoretical and methodological dimensions, but also ethical ones. This paper develops the theoretical-methodological decisions and ethical options adopted in the design, development and testing of an activity designed to elicit linguistic production in Spanish-speaking children (5 to 14 years old) with a focus on populations with difficulties in the attribution of mental states (AMS). The methodological considerations that justified the decisions taken and a series of qualitative observations arising from the preliminary analysis of the data are presented. The activity designed seeks the elicitation of a narration from images and the retelling of a story from a linguistic stimulus. The activity format was specifically designed to elicit narratives that include psychological events. In its design and elaboration, methodological criteria were used that privileged both the particularities of the study phenomenon and the target population of the research —children with pragmatic difficulties in the AMS. The process of creating and designing the stimulus involved not only the adherence to a theoretical-methodological framework, but also the decision to introduce changes in the design based on review instances, such as the judgement of experts, the results of the piloting stage and the observations and suggestions of the participants. This synergy and flexibility resulted in the optimization of the stimulus conditions to elicit varied and complex aspects of the phenomenon under study.