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Personal Narratives: Assessment and Intervention

Article  in  Perspectives on Language Learning and Education · October 2012

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Personal Narratives: Assessment and Intervention
Lynn S. Bliss
University of Houston
Houston, TX
Disclosure: Lynn S. Bliss has no financial or nonfinancial relationships related to the content of
this article.
Allyssa McCabe
University of Massachusetts Lowell
Lowell, MA
Disclosure: Allyssa McCabe has no financial or nonfinancial relationships related to the content
of this article.
Personal narratives are a critical aspect of functional discourse. The purpose of this article
is to describe the impairments of personal narrative discourse in children with language
learning disorders. The authors also consider cultural aspects of narrative discourse,
present assessment and intervention guidelines, and delineate cultural considerations.
This article focuses on personal narrative abilities. Personal narratives are descriptions
of real past events either experienced by a speaker or someone known to a speaker (Labov,
1972; Peterson & McCabe, 1983). They constitute a large section of functional discourse,
commonly found in the spontaneous conversation of preschool and school-aged children with
typical language development (TLD; Ghezzi, Bijou, Umbreit, & Chao, 1987; Preece, 1987).
Personal narratives are important for connecting with family and friends and for literacy
acquisition (Feagans, 1982; Snow, 1983; Snow & Dickinson, 1990).

Dimensions of Personal Narratives

Personal narratives are evaluated for the following dimensions:
x Topic maintenance, or the relation of utterances to a central topic or theme.
Utterances that do not maintain a topic may be irrelevant, tangential, or non-
narrative (e.g., scripts or descriptions of plans, preferences, or capabilities may be
inserted for no apparent reason except to prolong the speaker’s turn at talk).
x Informativeness refers to the completeness of a narrative. There are three aspects of
informativeness. The first is the presentation of the essential facts of an experience.
The second is the presentation of optional details that serve to elaborate a narrative.
The third, which was derived from a detailed high point analysis (Labov, 1972;
Peterson & McCabe, 1983), includes description (e.g., use of adjectives or adverbs),
action, and evaluation (e.g., the subjective significance of an event). Evaluation is
signaled by the use of subjective judgments (e.g., “I like to fish”), exclamations (e.g.
“Oh no!”), paralinguistic forms (e.g., “The car went BANG!”; “He saw a BIG cake!”),
negatives (e.g., “She does not live here”), causal statements (e.g., “I bought the book
because it’s new”), and intentions (e.g., “He wanted to leave”). A complete list of

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 evaluations can be found in several sources (McCabe & Bliss, 2003; McCabe &
Rollins, 1994; Peterson & McCabe, 1983).
x Event sequencing relates to the presentation of events in chronological or logical
order (e.g., “He fell down and hurt himself”).
x Referencing refers to the appropriate identification of individuals, locations, features,
and/or events (Halliday & Hasan, 1976). G
x Conjunctive cohesion consists of the use of words or phrases that link utterances
and events (e.g., and, then, because, but, and so). Conjunctions serve two functions.
The semantic function refers to the literal meanings of conjunctions (e.g.,
coordination, adversative, causality, and temporal). Conjunctions can also fill a
pragmatic role (Peterson & McCabe, 1991). They may initiate or close a passage
(e.g., initiation: “I bet you saw the sun coming up. But I saw these animals in the
zoo”; closure: “So, they lived happily ever after”), signal a chronological change in
ordering (e.g., “We went to Florida but first we went to Texas”), or change the focus
of discourse (e.g., “And then I fell down, but you know what?”).
x Fluency is the manner of production of a narrative. Discourse disruptions include
false starts, internal corrections, repetitions, and fillers.
Clinicians may analyze the use of the six dimensions of personal narratives described
by the Narrative Assessment Profile (McCabe & Bliss, 2003). One procedure is to use a 3-point
scoring system, scored with the following rubrics: (3) appropriate (the expected behavior occurs
frequently; some minor deviations may occur, such as one or two disruptions in fluency); (2)
variable (there is a mixture of appropriate and inappropriate use); and (1) inappropriate (the
expected behavior is absent or misused most of the time; the speaker clearly has difficulty with
the dimension; McCabe & Bliss, 2003).

Assessment
Personal narratives may be elicited with the conversational map procedure (McCabe &
Rollins, 1994). Its strength is that it is discourse-based. The adult provides a brief description
of an experience (e.g., ant bite) and then asks the child if he/she has had a similar experience.
If the child responds, “Yes,” then he/she is prompted to describe the event. If there is a “No,”
response, a new event is described. The narrative is prolonged by the use of neutral prompts
(e.g., “Uh huh,” “Tell me more”; McCabe & Rollins, 1994). Previous research has shown that
speakers are more likely to tell a narrative about their own experiences if a conversational
partner describes an experience first (McCabe & Bliss, 2003; Peterson & McCabe, 1983).
Four patterns are characteristic of impaired narration (McCabe & Bliss, 2003). The first
pattern reflects an inability to produce a personal narrative, a pattern labeled non-narrative or
pseudo-narrative. Children may describe a routine experience (also called a script) or list their
likes and dislikes. They cannot describe a specific event. Here is an example from a 7-year-old
boy who produces a script even though a personal narrative was elicited:
Clinician: When I was young my sister and I would fight all the time. We would yell at
each other and be mean to each other. Did you ever fight with your brothers or sisters?
Tell me about one time you fought.
Child: (1) Yeah, we fight . . . actually, I fight over mom, (2) and we fights over mom
because mom’s the nice one in our family. (3) She’s the nicest one. (4) We fight over
toys, a bunch . . . toys . . . umm, like game cube that’s mine . . . (5) and the game cube
is mine but when he wants to play it, when I say, “No,” (6) He just does it by hisself. (7)
He doesn’t ask me. Supposed to ask me if . . . but he does it without asking. (8) That’s
it.
A second pattern is characterized by reduced informativeness, that is, information that
is skeletal in nature, a pattern labeled skeletal narration. The child does not provide a sufficient
131
number of facts or emotions for the listener to understand completely the discourse. Here is an
example, produced by a 7-year old child when he was asked to describe a car accident. He
said:
(1) I saw all the cars driving. (2) And then I saw all the cars crashing into . . . (3) And my
car crashing to all of them. (4) And then . . . we just got caught. . . . (5) And we went . . .
(6) That’s it.
A third pattern exists where a child describes a personal narrative but some or all of the
dimensions previously described are impaired, a pattern labeled age-inappropriate leapfrog
narration, minimal type. With respect to topic maintenance, they may provide extraneous
information, especially at the end of a narrative or after a neutral prompt. Some children
appear to feel a need to fill discourse space and produce almost a stream-of-conscious type of
narrative. They do not appear to appropriately confine what they say to relevant information. In
addition, they tend to leave out critical information when producing a personal narrative
(Miranda, McCabe, & Bliss, 1998). They may fail to mention specifics about people, actions,
internal states, and orientation (Miranda et al., 1998). As a result, the listener must fill in this
critical missing information. In particular, children with a language impairment (LI) have
difficulty in marking the temporal ordering of events in personal narratives. Some do not
sequence events that have occurred in a past experience (Miranda et al., 1998). Referencing is
another area that can be problematic for children with LI. They may fail to verbally identify a
person, place, or object and/or use a pronoun in lieu of an initial referent (Miranda et al.,
1998). In addition, they may mention a person’s name without identifying the referent. They
also often have difficulty with conjunctive ties (Liles, 1985). However, in our experience, errors
with conjunctions can be best explained when their pragmatic function is considered as well as
their semantic function (Miranda et al., 1998). Semantic errors may reflect appropriate
pragmatic usage (e.g., the use of a causal conjunction to start an utterance: “So, how about
those Red Sox?”). Fluency is often deficient for children with LI (MacLachlan & Chapman,
1988). Their personal narratives have many disruptions. Some of the dysfluencies may reflect
word-finding disorders (German & Simon, 1991). In addition, disruptions may reflect a reduced
ability to plan, monitor, and sometimes repair utterances (Peterson & McCabe, 1983). Children
with LI may be focusing on content more than grammatical form (Purcell & Liles, 1992).
These difficulties that some children with LI exhibit are exemplified in the personal
narrative below, produced by a 9-year-old European North American child. He was diagnosed
as language impaired. He was asked if he had ever been to the hospital.
Clinician: Two weeks ago I had to go to the hospital to have some X-rays taken. Have
you ever been to the hospital?
Child: (1) Yeah, I had a X-ray because they they’re checking on my leg and I was scare
that I was going up there (2) and they gave me a balloon (3) and I went to um Toys R Us
(4) and gave me a toy but I never . . . (5) I uh I just broke my leg and I just fall down on
my bike because I got hurt and (6) my band aids on me . . . (7) put their off and I
jumped out of my bike and (8) I . . . I flied and then I jumped down.
Clinician: You jumped down?
Child: (9) Uhuh, on the grass . . . (10) and I um um our grandma um she died. (11) She
um she was getting older (12) our grandma and she died and the uh funeral . . . (13) My
ma and dad went to the funeral and then Aunt Cindy was there too (14) and we uh they
um uh everybody was sad that um uh that died . . . (15) and on my birthday I went on
my bike and I uh um . . . (16) I just jump on my bike and I just balance on my . . . (17)
and I did it with uh I did do it with only my hands. 18) I didn’t do it without my hands
and I uh um one hand too.
This narrative is impaired in all dimensions.

132
 x Topic Maintenance: Inappropriate—several topics are intermingled, such as hospital
activities, bike riding, and events pertaining to the grandmother.
x Event Sequencing: Inappropriate—this sample represents a leapfrogging structure in
which events are not presented chronologically. The following events are presented
achronologically: broken leg, death of grandmother, and bike ride.
x Informativeness: Inappropriate—there is insufficient information in order for the
listener to know what happened to the child’s leg; elaboration is reduced; evaluation
(utterances 1, 4, 5, etc.) and action (utterances 1, 2, 4, etc.) are well represented
while description is minimal.
x Referencing: Variable—some pronoun identities are specified (utterances 11, 14);
some are understood by the context (“they” in utterances 1 and 2), some are
unspecified (“there” in utterance 1, “they’re” in utterance 7) and some are vague (“it”
in utterances 17 and 18).
x Conjunctive Cohesion: Variable—appropriate semantic cohesion is evident in
coordination (utterances 1, 2, 3, etc.), two violations are evident (utterances 5 and
13); appropriate pragmatic use is found in change of focus (utterances 10 and 15).
x Fluency: Inappropriate—false starts (utterances 4, 12, 15, etc.), internal corrections
(utterances 10 and 14), repetitions (utterances 8, 11, 12), and excessive use of fillers
(utterances 10, 14, 15).
Finally, there is a narrative pattern characterized by too much information, a pattern
labeled age-inappropriate leapfrog narration, verbose type. Usually, these narratives are also in
a stream-of-consciousness form. The speaker rambles and proceeds from one topic to another.
Here is an example from a 9-year-old child with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder
(ADHD), describing a trip to the hospital after a dog bit him.
(1) Well, he was chewing up something (2) and I did not like it. (3) But you know what?
(4) He was being such a . . . such a . . . he was being so sick . . . (5) He was just chewing
it up, sucking. (6) I got mad at him (7) and . . . and . . . then I . . . just I just tried to
spank him (8) and he really didn’t notice who was behind him and (9) and I, and I was
playing Nintendo, you know . . . (10) but then, well I was fixin’ to jump (11) so he could
just scratch the table . . . (12) but . . . but . . . um . . . before I could even jump, he bit
me right on my lip, right here. (13) Can you see the scar here still? (14) But, you know
what? (15) When I had to get the stitches out . . . (16) You wanna know about the really
stupid lady? (17) I hope she got fired. (18) You know why? (19) She was so stupid? (20)
You know what she did? (21) Well you see umm . . . umm . . . (22) Well, not the stupid
lady, these people that were trying to take out my stitches . . . (23) They were umm,
umm . . . (24) No matter how strong they are . . . they’re so stupid . . . ’cause they just
. . . you know . . . (25) You should get the point. (26) But, you know what? (27) You
know how they were taking my stitches out? (28) They just like, when they put them it
. . . (29) Uhmm, even when they, you know . . . they were just pull them all up like that,
and then like that [gestures in a pulling direction], and then like that [more gestures] or
something (30) and then I just couldn’t hold still (31) um . . . so then they get this one
dopey lady to come hold me down (32) and then . . . ummm she hold me down so hard
. . . (33) um . . . when I got out of there in the park . . . in the parking lot, there was . . .
(34) I had this big bruise on my cheek. (35) She grabbed me that hard.
x Topic Maintenance: Variable—while all the utterances pertain to the dog bite and its
consequences, the narrative takes a turn at utterance 22. We do not know why, now
that the narrator has piqued our curiosity about “the stupid lady,” he departs to a
discussion of the people who “were trying to take out” his stitches.
x Event Sequencing: Appropriate—all events are sequenced chronologically.

133
 x Informativeness: Variable—we have enough specific facts, as well as ample
elaboration. There are abundant references to actions (1, 7, 9, etc.), evaluation (2, 6,
etc.), though no pure description. The narrator also has informativeness problems
that he himself indicates (25); when he says “You should get the point,” we do not.
x Referencing: Variable—the interviewer establishes reference to the main actor of the
piece, the narrator’s dog. The narrator does introduce one other character (16): “You
wanna know about the really stupid lady?” However, this is not as helpful as calling
the person a nurse (note that lab technician would be more applicable but unlikely
from a 9-year-old child with TLD). Other vague references include “it” in 2, and “one
dopey lady” in 31.
x Conjunctive Cohesion: Appropriate—the narrator uses “and,” “but,” “and then,” “but
then,” “but before,” and “so” appropriately and abundantly to refer to coordination,
temporal sequence, and causality. There is a pragmatic use of “but” to refer to a
change of focus.
x Fluency: Variable. There are a few filled pauses (21, 33) that are common in the
speech of children with TLD. However, there are several abandoned sentences (15,
21, 24) that indicate problems sustaining focus in discourse.

Cultural Considerations and Assessment

Cultural influences on personal narrative discourse need to be considered as a critical
aspect of assessment. A language disorder must be differentiated from cultural differences in
the production of personal narratives. American children from cultures other than European
North American culture have often been found to produce personal narratives that reflect the
cultural style of their community, as well as ones that reflect European North American
patterns (McCabe, Bliss, Barra, & Bennett, 2008). Cultural patterns from some communities
will be briefly described in order to assist the clinician in differentiating a narrative disorder
from a cultural pattern.
Some African American children produce topic-associating personal narratives on
occasion (Champion & McCabe, in press; Heath, 1983; Hyon & Sulzby, 1994). These narratives
are characterized by the inclusion of several experiences in one narrative, which would be
considered to be broad topic maintenance. Informativeness in such narratives is exemplified by
lengthy descriptions of people and events as well as numerous evaluative elements (Champion,
2003; Hyon & Sulzby, 1994; Michaels, 1991). Referencing may not be overtly stated; the
speaker may assume the referent is known to the listener.
Latino cultural differences are evident in narration. There are many Spanish-speaking
cultures and their narrative patterns are not uniform (see McCabe, Bailey, & Melzi, 2008). We
will briefly summarize the trends for some speakers of Spanish. A broad use of topic
maintenance may be found. Speakers from Spanish-speaking communities may include
extended family members in relation to experiences to inform the listener about the narrator
(McCabe & Bliss, 2004–2005; Rodino, Gimbert, Perez, Craddock-Willis, & McCabe, 1991;
Ucelli, 1997). These connections between family members and events may sound tangential to
some listeners from outside the community but they are in fact an integral part of the narrative
experience of a speaker. Informativeness should be reevaluated in light of what is known
regarding Spanish narration. For example, European North American speakers may feel that
key events are omitted when, in fact, the point of telling a story for Spanish-American narrators
may not be to recount events so much as it is to let listeners know about the narrators’ families
(Silva & McCabe, 1996). Event sequencing may not be pronounced when storytelling is
influenced by Latino culture, due to the fact that parents do not emphasize it in exchanging
narratives with their children (Melzi, 1997). Referencing may be characterized by ellipsis, in
which agents or subjects are not used because the use of previously identified agents of
sentences is optional in Spanish (Gutierrez-Clellen & Heinrichs-Ramos, 1993). Fluency may be

134
affected if bilingual speakers hesitate and use fillers or other disruptions as a means of buying
time to find appropriate words in English. In other words, the dimensions of Narrative
Assessment Protocol (NAP) must be understood within the context of the narrator’s culture.
Speakers from Asian communities also have unique personal narratives. Caution must
be used because there are also many Asian communities. The practices of children who speak
Japanese will be briefly summarized as an example of such communities. Similar patterns are
evident in narrators from Chinese and Taiwanese cultures (McCabe, 1996; McCabe & Bliss,
2003). Topic maintenance is characterized by combining two or three similar events into a
single narrative. This is a stated preference among Japanese adults and would be expected to
be transmitted to children (Minami & McCabe, 1991). Multiple-event narratives are deemed
more interesting than single-event narratives (Minami & McCabe, 1995). Japanese children
and adults supply minimal information with the expectation that their listeners will flesh out
details. There is, in other words, a distinct cultural preference for conciseness. Japanese
mothers encourage brevity by affectionately interrupting their children to show them that short
turns at talk are desirable (Minami & McCabe, 1995). Event sequencing is evident, though with
a limited number of actions. Referencing is characterized by omission of pronouns because
they can be inferred from the message (Minami & McCabe, 1991). Conjunctions and the
Japanese equivalent of “you know” (ne) are common (Minami, 2002). Fluency may be disrupted
if the speaker is relatively unfamiliar with English and is searching for appropriate English
vocabulary.
Clinicians need to understand the cultural backgrounds and home discourse styles of
their clients and their families before they make clinical decisions. Language deficits may
accompany cultural differences. Clinicians should attempt to avoid diagnosing cultural
difference as deficit or mistakenly attributing narrative deficits as cultural differences. In other
words, clinicians should certainly not dismiss all unusual aspects of narration from a child of a
different ethnicity than their own as simply cultural differences. Both mistakes are
shortchanging children. If clinicians do not feel confident that they can differentiate cultural
differences from deficits, then they should consult a fluent adult member of the child’s
community.

Intervention
The goal of intervention is to enable children to develop an organizational structure for
personal narratives. Intervention strategies for the four narrative patterns described are
presented below. The goal of intervention is to enable children to produce a coherent narrative,
regardless of the cultural pattern that is evident. Unfortunately, there is not much research in
the area of effective intervention of personal narratives. The forthcoming discussion reflects our
personal clinical experiences.
The first pattern is an inability to produce a narrative (non-narrative or pseudo-
narrative). Clinicians should practice a simple structure of a brief narrative, temporally
sequenced, with three to five actions that represent a beginning, middle, and end of an
experience. Temporal words, such as first, next, and last, can be used to assist in chronological
sequencing of events. The clinician should model a brief narrative and ask the child to repeat
it. Gradually, longer narratives should be introduced and the amount of modeling eventually
decreased.
In the second pattern, skeletal narrative, a child has basic narrative structure but is
clearly lagging behind peers. The clinician can ask contingent queries (i.e., queries tightly
related/responsive to what child had just said) in order to elicit more information about some
event the child has described. Such requests for increased detail should not only include
specific facts but emotions, such as feelings, wants, and reactions. The clinician can also
provide modeling as an example. Narratives should proceed in length from minimal additions of
information to increased information.

135
 Strategies are needed to improve the dimensions of narrative structure and content for
the third narrative pattern, age-inappropriate leapfrog narration, minimal type. The most
general dimensions should be focused on before more specific aspects of discourse coherence.
For example, topic maintenance, informativeness, and event sequencing should receive
attention before referencing, conjunctive cohesion, and fluency. The clinician will need to
enable the child to speak on one topic by using contingent queries about the experience the
child described. A clinician can model a brief narrative on the topic the child wants to discuss,
if necessary. To promote informativeness, the clinician should ask questions (a) about puzzling
gaps in a child’s story and (b) for additional information about the setting of events and the
meaning of those events to the child. Perhaps the clinician could also model and then have the
child repeat an exemplary narrative. Event sequencing can be fostered by having the child
understand and review the temporal events of the narrative that was produced. Temporal
words, such as first, next, and last, often serve as anchor points to help guide the child in the
narrative.
Referencing can also be targeted through contingent query, by asking the child to
specify who the referents refer to. Conjunctive cohesion can be advanced by developing
meaningful contexts in which a conjunction would be necessary. For example, a clinician could
ask the child to focus on causality: “Why do you think your brother hit you yesterday?” Finally,
fluency can be targeted, if necessary. Often, when the other dimensions are improved, fluency
also improves. That is, dysfluencies frequently reflect an inability to plan or structure
discourse. However, some dysfluency may reflect word retrieval deficits, in which case,
clinicians should utilize approaches for facilitating word finding (German & Simon, 1991;
McGregor & Leonard, 1989).
Finally, clinicians with clients who exhibit age-inappropriate leapfrog narration, verbose
type need to become aware of their verbosity. This can be accomplished by having them listen
to their own narratives, with tape recorded samples of their discourse. They can also be cued
by the clinician when they provide too much information. Frequently, verbose narratives suffer
from topic maintenance problems. The strategies presented for the third narrative pattern
would be relevant.
Regardless of the type of problematic narrative, clinicians will need to work in
conjunction with children’s classroom teachers to be effective. That is, the child will need to be
able to write a classically structured narrative and comprehend a classically structured
narrative as well as to tell such narratives.
A critical component of intervention for personal narratives is generalization or transfer
of skills. Because we know that this genre is used in daily discourse, we need to make sure
that the abilities are transferred from the clinic to natural contexts. Several procedures are
appropriate to foster transfer of skills. Children with LI need to be aware of the consequences of
limited discourse, and one way to do this is by discussing situations that call for personal
narratives (e.g., a teacher asks, “Why were you late for school?” Or a doctor asks, “How did you
break your leg?”). With all four problematic narrative patterns listed above, listener(s) may act
bewildered, misinterpret the message, and/or ask for clarification. The aim is to enable the
speaker to realize that more complete, better-formed narratives need to be produced.
Generalization can also be accomplished by having the child tell the narrative to different
listeners and producing personal narratives on different topics.
In summary, this article has highlighted the importance of personal narratives in
functional discourse. We presented assessment guidelines, which take into account the
cultural background of a speaker. Intervention strategies focus on enabling children to
structure their discourse for coherent personal narratives.

136
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