Concurrent and Longitudinal Relationships Between Development in Graphic, Language and Symbolic Play Domains from the Fourth to the Fifth Year

This research investigated the developing inter‐relationships between language, graphic symbolism and symbolic play both concurrently and longitudinally from the fourth to the fifth year of childhood. Sixty children ( n  = 60) aged between 3 and 4 years completed multiple assessments of language and assessments of graphic symbolism, symbolic play and non‐verbal intelligence. A year later, 31 children ( n  = 31) were re‐tested using the same assessments. The findings revealed that skills within each symbolic domain were inter‐related during the fourth year, appearing to develop in a domain‐general type fashion based upon a common underlying symbolic mechanism. However, between the fourth and the fifth years, only language had predictive validity, suggesting a shift towards the verbal mediation of symbolic play and graphic symbolism as language becomes progressively internalized (Vygotsky, 1962, 1978). Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.