Research Update: Exploring Narrative Thought and Symbol Literacy in Children

Beyond sensory perception, humans possess a profound drive to connect material, spatial, and temporal phenomena to make sense of reality. This process is primarily made tangible through narratives; a communal effort where we construct our understanding of the world through the stories we inherit and create.

Narrative is not merely limited to storytelling; it sustains our fundamental reasoning. Consequently, narrative thought is a central pillar of Symbol Literacy. In developing this pedagogical approach, Prof. Adrian-Mario Gellel hypothesises that narrative thought enables children to interpret their environment and cultural artifacts by allowing them to imagine, reason, and engage with both personal and collective memory.

Drawing inspiration from the works of Giambattista Vico and Jerome Bruner, this research explores the role of narrative in children’s sense-making processes. To investigate whether narrative thought patterns exist across different cultural contexts, the Symbol Literacy team in collaboration with Prof. Giuseppina Marsico and Prof. Monica Mollo, from the University of Salerno, collected 200 narratives and additional socio-cognitive data from 100 Italian children (aged 8–11). This follows a recent large-scale study conducted among 820 Maltese children.

Preliminary Findings and Implications Initial analysis of the Maltese data suggests a potential link between story elements and children’s working memory, indicating the presence of distinct narrative reasoning patterns. If these patterns are replicated in the Italian cohort, the implications for education, psychology, and spiritual wellbeing could be transformative.

Because meaning-making is rooted in an innate need to connect with the self, others, nature, and the "Ultimate reality," this research may uncover universal processes that help educators heighten a child’s ability to perceive and connect meaningful cultural affordances.

The anonymised data and results will be discussed by an international, interdisciplinary team of academics from six universities (Haute Ecole Pédagogique BEJUNE, Presbyterian Union Seminary, University of Kent, University of Malta, University of Salerno, Yale).

This research is made possible through the strategic support and funding of the Children’s Spirituality Research & Innovation Hub.