Abstract:

This study examined the frequency and lexical diversity of metacognitive verbs (e.g., think, know, believe) and metalinguistic verbs (e.g., say, tell, explain) in the spoken discourse of Palestinian Arabic-speaking adolescents across narrative retelling and critical thinking tasks. We also investigated associations between verb use, syntactic complexity, macrostructural organization, and critical-thinking performance. Forty-two seventh-grade students individually retold two fables and responded to higher-order critical thinking questions. Transcripts were coded for the frequency and diversity of metacognitive and metalinguistic verbs, along with measures of syntactic complexity, narrative macrostructure, and critical thinking. Results indicated task-sensitive patterns: critical thinking responses elicited greater frequency and diversity of metacognitive verbs, whereas narrative retellings elicited greater frequency and diversity of metalinguistic verbs. Notably, both frequency and diversity of metacognitive verbs in narrative discourse were significantly associated with critical-thinking performance. Findings suggest that adolescents flexibly recruit mental-state and language-referential verbs according to discourse demands, with metacognitive verb use emerging as a linguistic marker of higher-order reasoning.

Keywords:

Metacognitive verbs, metalinguistic verbs, narrative discourse, critical thinking, adolescence, Palestinian Arabic.