A Longitudinal Study of Conflict and Inner State Talk in Children’s Conversations with Mothers and Younger Siblings

This study examined developmental change and variation across social context in the quality of children’s conversations, with a dual focus on (a) conflict and (b) inner state talk (IST). Each measure was coded as a proportion of total talk, using transcripts from 57 3- to 6-yearolds, filmed at home at two time-points (12-months apart) in two distinct contexts (dyadic play with younger siblings and unstructured routine interactions with mothers). Frequencies of conflict and IST did not change between time-points. However, IST changed in function, such that the proportion of IST within explanations increased over time. At each time-point: (1) children talked about inner states (especially others’ inner states) more often with younger siblings than with mothers; and (2) conflict was more strongly associated with talk about children’s own inner states within conversations with mothers (mean r = .46) than with younger siblings (mean r = .02). Together, these findings highlight the need to consider both conflict and IST as relationship-specific constructs.