2. Features of the structure and semantics of internal speech

L.S. Vygotsky completely rejected the view of inner speech as “speech minus sound”. He wrote about a very special structure and way of functioning of internal speech (45). For several generations, before the advent of scientific works of L.S. Vygotsky, and, above all, the book Thinking and Speech (1934), many psychologists believed that internal speech is the same external speech, but with a truncated end, without speech motorics. She was represented as “speaking to herself,” built according to the same laws of syntax and semantics as external speech. T.N. Ushakov points to the fallacy of this opinion (224). A simple and convincing proof of this is the ability of human thinking to solve complex intellectual problems in a split second, make decisions, choose the right path to achieve the intended goal. If “speech to oneself” were a simple duplication of external speech, it would proceed with the same speed as external speech. Consequently, internal speech, performing regulatory and planning functions in the organization of human activity and behavior, has a special, “reduced structure” (45).

According to the theoretical concept of L.S. Vygotsky, in his inner speech, "has its own particular syntax," which finds its expression in the seeming fragmentaryness, fragmentation, and shortness of inner speech in comparison with outer. Recorded on a phonograph, it "would have been abbreviated, fragmentary, incoherent, unrecognizable and incomprehensible compared with external speech" (45, p. 332). When conducting their experiments LS. Vygotsky noted the presence and growth of similar features of the child's egocentric speech; This allowed him to give an objective explanation of the reason for the shortening of internal speech. He noted that this is not a simple tendency to shorten and omit words, but a peculiar tendency to shorten phrases and sentences along the way of approaching that variant of the structure of this language unit, “where the predicate and its related parts of the sentence are preserved by omitting the subject and relating to words to him ”(45, p. 333). The main syntactic form of internal speech is LS. Vygotsky considered "pure and absolute predicativeness." This feature is inherent in the dialogical form of external speech in the presence of a certain psychological closeness of interlocutors, when it is possible to understand “from half a word”, “from a hint”. When a person communicates with himself, it is possible to transmit almost without words the most difficult thoughts, which leads to the dominance of pure predicativeness in inner speech. Its syntax is simplified to the maximum, resulting in “absolute concentration of thought” (ibid., P. 343).

A.R. Luria, looking after LS Vygotsky this feature of the "semantics" of internal speech, gives her the following explanation: a person who is trying to solve a problem knows well what is at stake. This means that the nominative function of speech, an indication that there is a “subject” of a message, is already “initially” included in internal speech and does not need a special designation. It remains to indicate what exactly should be said about this topic, what should be added to the new (that is, to identify and reveal the “Rem” of the utterance). Thus, internal speech never denotes a subject, does not contain a subject, it indicates what exactly needs to be performed. “In other words, while remaining collapsed and amorphous in its structure, it always maintains its predicative function” (148, p. 174).

Highlighting this feature of inner speech - “always omit the subject and consist of only predicates,” LS Vygotsky put forward a statement about the possible discrepancy between the grammatical and psychological subject and predicate in a speech statement. He wrote that in a complex phrase “any member of a sentence can become a psychological predicate, and then he bears the logical stress, the semantic function of which consists precisely in distinguishing the psychological predicate” (45, p. 309).

Not all researchers fully share the conceptual position of L.S. Vygotsky speaks of the “absolute predicativeness” of inner speech, rightly seeing in this a certain artificial “hyperbolization” of the quality inherent in this type of speech activity (12, 13, 224). At the same time, practically none of modern researchers denies the fact that predicativeness is the most important distinguishing feature of internal speech.

The contraction of internal speech is not exhausted by its predicativeness. The next most important feature of the inner speech of L. S. Vygotsky calls the “reduction of phonetic moments of speech”. In internal speech, the role of kinesthetic speech stimulations is reduced to a minimum, there is never any need to utter words to the end. A person already understands by the very intention what word he should say. The whole word, as a stable sound complex, in the internal speech, according to the hypothesis LS Vygotsky, never reproduced completely; it is replaced by a sound "frame" of the word in the form of supporting consonants ("kn" or "kg" - instead of "book") or the root morpheme (45). “Inner speech, - according to Vygotsky, - is in the exact sense speech almost without words” (45, p. 345).

The third specific feature of the inner speech arising from the first two, LS Vygotsky considers the special relationship between the semantic and the phasic aspects of speech. The phasic side of speech (its external, material form) is reduced to a minimum here, its syntax and phonetics are simplified and condensed to the maximum. “The meaning of the word comes to the fore. Inner speech operates primarily with semantics, but not with the phonetics of speech ”(ibid., P. 346). As a result, a very special semantic structure of inner speech is created. L.S. Vygotsky in this connection points out three main features of its semantic aspect. The first of these is the predominance of the meaning of the word over its meaning. The meaning of the word is a collection of all the psychological facts that arise in our consciousness due to the word. This component of the semantics of the word is a complex, dynamic formation. The meaning of the word is the basic component of its semantics, distinguished by stability and accuracy. The meaning is “constant” and invariable with all changes of meaning in a different context of speech. In internal speech, the predominance of meaning over the meaning “is brought to the mathematical limit and is presented in absolute form. Here the prevalence of meaning over a meaning, a phrase over a word, the whole context over a phrase is not an exception, but a permanent rule ”(45, p. 348).

From here follow two other features of the semantics of internal speech. One ls Vygotsky calls words merging, or “agglutination”. This phenomenon can be found in some languages ​​(in the external form of their realization), for example, in German. A noun is formed from several words or an entire phrase. Such "aggregates of words" are formed according to a certain law, the greatest emphasis is always given to the main root, or the main concept. A similar phenomenon is observed in the child's egocentric speech. Agglutination as a method of forming single compound words becomes more and more pronounced as this form of speech approaches the inner speech.

Another feature of the semantics of internal speech is as follows. “... The meanings of words, more dynamic and wider than their meanings, reveal other laws of association and merging with each other than those that can be observed when combining and merging verbal meanings” (ibid., P. 349). L.S. Vygotsky calls this phenomenon "the influence and infusion of meaning." The meanings of this are “as if merging into each other”, the preceding ones are contained subsequently or modify it. The “key word” as if absorbs the meaning of the previous and subsequent words. In internal speech, the word as a sign of the language "is much more loaded with meaning" than in external speech, it is "a concentrated bunch of meaning" (ibid., P. 350).

The peculiarity of internal speech is largely determined by the specifics of its semantic structure. Under the conditions of inner speech, a special, “inner dialect” always arises. Each word gradually acquires new shades, semantic nuances, which leads to the birth of individual meanings of words that are understandable only in terms of inner speech. Proceeding from this, “verbal meanings in internal speech are always idioms that cannot be translated into the language of external speech” (45, p. 351).

Based on an experimental study of egocentric speech, L.S. Vygotsky identified the following main features of internal speech:

- maximum (“absolute”) predicativeness;

- contraction, contraction of the structure and the "semantics" of speech utterance;

- agglutination of structural and semantic elements; "Thickening" of speech; maximum “semantic saturation” of intra-verbal utterances;

- transformation, transformation of the language of external speech (in the transition of external egocentric speech into internal);

- the predominance of "meaning" (speech) over "value";

- ideomatichnost (individual semantics) of speech.

L.S. Vygotsky outlined a broad and long-term plan for the psychological study of internal speech as a mechanism of speech thinking, which had a great influence on all subsequent studies of this problem. The closest associate and follower is L.S. Vygotsky A.R. Luria made an attempt to investigate the brain mechanisms of internal speech. Extremely important data were obtained by him in the examination of patients with local brain lesions (151, 153, 155). Conducted special psychological studies have confirmed the fact that the child’s speech, called egocentric, retains its analyzing, planning and regulating functions when moving to internal speech. A child who already has internal speech is able to regulate complex volitional actions. Research A.R. Luria showed that "the brain mechanisms of the regulatory function of speech do not coincide with those of the brain mechanisms that provide the sound or semantic side of speech processes" (148, p. 175). In studies A.R. Luria was found that with the defeat of the “Wernicke zone”, speech disturbed in the phonemic or articulation relation does not lose its regulatory functions. The same can be said about patients with afferent motor aphasia with the defeat of the cortical parts of the motor analyzer. Such patients continue to actively regulate their actions in accordance with the emerging motives.

The lesion of the SRW zone (the inferior and parietal-occipital parts of the left hemisphere of the brain), which provides an understanding of complex logical and grammatical constructions, resulting in profound violations of the semantic side of speech, also does not lead to a loss of the regulatory function of speech. In such patients, the internal speech with its predicative function remains largely intact. These patients continue to work hard to eliminate their defect; relying on internal speech, they retain the ability to transform internal “simultaneous schemes” of speech utterances into a whole chain of consecutive “successive acts” of external speech.

At the same time, studies have shown that the complex forms of volitional act, which is based on the mediating function of internal speech, are controlled by the anterior sections of the cerebral cortex, namely the premotor and prefrontal areas of the anterior sections of the left hemisphere. With the defeat of the first of them, along with a violation of motor skills, the speech of the patient suffers greatly. It becomes “steep”, loses predicative elements, in some cases only nominative elements remain.

With the defeat of the prefrontal cortex, the movements and speech of the patient do not reveal such dramatic changes, however, “the defeat of the frontal lobes of the brain disrupts the internal dynamics of a planned, organized, arbitrary act in general and directed speech activity in particular” (148, p. 180). In these patients, it is the very form of action, organized with the help of the inner speech, that develops in the child in the process of decreasing egocentric speech. A.R. Luria concludes that with the defeat of these areas of the cerebral cortex, internal speech with its predicative function suffers significantly more than with the defeat of other parts of the brain (146, 148).

The study of internal speech in the physiological plan was actively engaged and other authors. So, TN Ushakova (224, 227) distinguishes three hierarchically organized levels in the mechanisms of internal speech. These levels, according to the author, are clearly “divorced” in ontogenesis when the child masters the language.

The first level is the mechanisms of operating with individual words, usually denoting phenomena of the external world. It implements the nominative function of language and speech. This is consistent with the research of M.M. Koltsova (105), who showed that traces of verbal signals in the cerebral cortex of a child, together with impressions of perceived objects, form a specialized complex of temporary connections. These complexes in the ontogenetic development of the child constitute the "basic level" of the mechanisms of internal speech.

The second level is the formation of multiple links between the basic elements. A so-called “verbal network” is being formed - a kind of materialized “language vocabulary” (81, p. 133). The fact of physiological connectedness of traces of verbal signals in the human brain was first discovered in 1935 by A.Ya. Fedorov, which was later repeatedly reproduced in experimental studies of American and domestic scientists. These studies have shown that the semantic and linguistic connectedness of words corresponds to the “connectedness” of their traces in the nervous system. T.N. Ushakov defines these connections as “semantic fields” or “verbal networks”. When the node of the “verbal network” is activated, the excitation, damping, extends to all adjacent structures. Connections within the “verbal network” are stable, persist throughout life and in their essential features are the same for all people. According to TN Ushakova, in the "verbal network" (it is also the "semantic field"), the human language experience materializes. T.N. Ushakov believes that the unit for the implementation of internal speech is not “quasi-words” (agglutinated sound combinations consisting of “fragments” of words), but whole words that carry the main “semantic load” in speech activity. The researcher refers to them quite widely used in psychology and pedagogy by the term “keywords”. It is these words that are “voiced” in the internal speech during the speech-thinking process and, in contrast to the “quasi-words,” are quite clearly understood by the subject of speech activity (224).

The two mentioned levels of organization of internal speech are static and standard, while human speech is dynamic and individual. Therefore, the “verbal network” is only a prerequisite that determines the possibility of the speech process. T.N. Ushakov assumes the existence of a third, dynamic, level, according to the temporal and substantial characteristics of the corresponding produced speech. From the physiological side, the dynamic level of internal speech consists of rapidly alternating activations of individual nodes of the “verbal network” in their special integrations. Each word uttered by a person is preceded by the activation of the corresponding structure of internal speech, which is then recoded into commands to articular organs (224).

In the conducted TN Ushakov's experiments revealed that during the formation of a sentence (in the internal plan) it is possible to register in the internal speech the activation of traces of those words that are used in this sentence. This process proceeds with the wide inclusion of the structures of the “verbal network”, with the activation of not only local basic elements, but entire “semantic nodes”. Their activation is uneven, rapidly changing in time. At the beginning of the formation of a sentence, the structures that correspond to its main members are most active, and later - the structures of the beginning and end of the verbal chain of utterance.

In another series of experiments (226), the neurodynamic processes of the internal speech of the listening partner were investigated. It turned out that the understanding of audible speech is based on complex processes occurring in the "verbal network". The perception of a word triggers the activation of a “semantic field” that includes the basic elements of semantically related words. A polysemantic word activates, depending on the context, one of the possible “semantic fields”. The understanding of the heard word is due to the fact which “semantic field” is “combined” together with the trace of the influencing word. Each word has many meanings and acquires a specific meaning only in a specific speech context.

In addition to the functional mechanism of internal speech, TN. Ushakova studied the relationship of intra-speech processes with the corresponding brain structures. She developed an experimental research method using the method of distant synchronization of brain biopotentials (DSB) according to M.N. Livanov. The method is based on the following phenomenon: areas of the brain that are actively working at the time of the study show an increase in the synchronism of EEG oscillations.This makes it possible to identify areas of the brain that are activated during the implementation of the mental process. The method for estimating the DRC opens up new opportunities in this area; it can be applied to healthy people, allows us to imagine brain activity not in parts, but systemically, it makes it possible to identify the dynamics of the inclusion of brain areas in the process of mental activity. Research data TN. Ushakova is mainly confirmed by the data of neuropsychological studies of A.R. Luria and E.G. Simernitskoy (145, 146, etc.)

В психолингвистике создано несколько научных концепций, определяющих специфические особенности внутренней речи как вида речевой деятельности. В отечественной психолингвистике наибольшее распространение получила теоретическая концепция, разработанная А.А. Леонтьевым совместно с Т.В. Рябовой-Ахутиной в конце 1960-х – начале 1970-х гг. (12, 134 и др.).

Авторы данной концепции четко противопоставляют друг другу такие понятия, как «собственно внутренняя речь» (внутренняя речь в трактовке Л.С. Выготского), «внутреннее проговаривание» и «внутреннее программирование речевого высказывания».

Внутреннее проговаривание как форма внутренней речи, предполагает наличие скрытой речедвигательной активности органов артикуляции, имитирующей процессы, происходящие при внешней речи. P.I. Гальперин определил это явление как скрытую внешнюю речь, или как «внешнюю речь про себя» (49, с. 157). Внутреннее проговаривание возникает при выполнении трудных заданий, например при решении математических задач, при чтении и переводе иностранных текстов, при запоминании и припоминании словесного материала, при письменном изложении мыслей и т. д. Другими словами, внутреннее проговаривание связано с умственными действиями, протекающими в развернутой, еще не автоматизированной форме.

Собственно внутренняя речь — это речевое действие, перенесенное «вовнутрь», производимое в свернутой, редуцированной форме. В типичном случае она возникает при решении интеллектуальной задачи. Внутренняя речь может сопровождаться внутренним проговариванием при решении сложных заданий, но это не обязательное условие ее осуществления. Собственно внутренняя речь может быть представлена только отдельными «намеками», речедвигательными признаками слов, являющихся «опорными» признаками отдельных слов и словосочетаний. (Своеобразный аналог «квазислов» и опорных звукокомплексов по Л.С. Выготскому.[140] )

Таким образом, согласно данной концепции, у внутренней речи есть два «полюса». Один – это внутренняя речь, максимально приближенная к внешней, разговорной речи, чаще всего сопровождающаяся проговариванием. Второй «полюс» – «максимально свернутая внутренняя речь, менее всего связанная с проговариванием и стоящая на грани выпадения из интеллектуального акта и превращения его в простой рефлекторный акт» (118, с. 158). Третье понятие, ключевое для данной теории внутренней речи, – понятие внутреннего программирования, которое А.А. Леонтьев трактует как «неосознаваемое построение некоторой схемы, на основе которой в дальнейшем порождается речевое высказывание» (там же, с. 158). Соотношение внутренней речи и внутреннего программирования выступает как «соотношение конечного и промежуточного звена». Согласно А.А. Леонтьеву, внутреннее программирование может развертываться либо во внешнюю, либо во внутреннюю речь. Переход к внешней речи происходит по правилам грамматического и семантического развертывания максимально обобщенной смысловой программы; переход к внутренней речи также связан с применением определенных правил, своего рода «минимальной грамматики». A.A. Леонтьевым была предложена обобщенная схема соотношения внутреннего программирования и внутренней речи:

All three components of internal speech (in its broadest sense) are closely interrelated and can participate in the same act of speech-thinking activity.