Judith Felson Duchan

The role of interclausal connectives in narrative structuring: Evidence from adults' interpretations of simple stories

This study explores the role of interclausal connectives as a set of linguistic devices which help the reader interpret a narrative text. We show that: (a) even simple narrative texts have a range of interpretations; (b) the variability of the interpretations decreases with the presence of the interclausal connectives; (c) the role of two connectives, then and and, serve primarily to identify variations in continuity between information in the incoming clause and previously known events; (d) so, because, and but signal causality or adversity and do so primarily from a subjective perspective; and (e) the interpretation of a particular clause in the text may be affected by story events whether or not they are actually expressed in the text. We compare four possible views of how interclausal connectives function in narratives: an empty view, a local cohesion view, a global marker view, and a mental model‐deictic shift view. The data support the fourth view, in which readers use interclausal connectives to si...

A Set of Observational Measures for Rating Support and Participation in Conversation Between Adults with Aphasia and Their Conversation Partners

Abstract Conversation partners of individuals with aphasia, including health care professionals, families, and others, play a role that is as important for communication as the language disorder suffered by individuals with aphasia. Two complementary measures designed to capture elements of conversation between adults with aphasia and their speaking conversation partners have been developed. The first measure provides an index of the conversation partner’s skill in providing conversational support. The second provides an index of the level of participation in conversation by the person with aphasia. This article describes the development of the measures, including preliminary psychometric data, and discusses applications.

“I Am Intelligent”: The Social Construction of Mental Retardation

Mental retardation, like marriage, is a cultural concept and one that is framed within a complex set of understandings. The meanings of mental retardation are created from a particular cultural backdrop and from various points of view within that cultural context. Our aim in this article is to provide convincing evidence to show that mental retardation does not exist as fact separate from interpretation, but that it is a concept constructed to account for selected events, behaviors, or phenomena. Our evidence that mental retardation is a conceptual construction is drawn from the research and professional literature that contains two opposing views of retardation: the normative view that considers normal children and adults as a basis for understanding those diagnosed retarded and the competence view that sees the behavior of those labeled retarded as sometimes different from but not inferior to those diagnosed as normal. Accompanying the opposing views of mental retardation are differences of opinion about how best to conduct research with individuals classified as retarded. Two research approaches exist that are comparable to the two views of retardation. One is the approach that sees the research endeavor as being that of carrying out experiments to reveal the objective truths about various aspects of retardation. Another approach holds that retardation differs depending on ones point of view. The aim of this second view is to substantiate various interpretations of retardation to explain why those seen as retarded do what they do. Researchers who do experiments are trying to discover factors that influence or characterize behavior of those who are diagnosed retarded. Researchers who carry out interpretive research do so in the tradition of ethnography or symbolic interaction; they ask how various aspects of retardation are understood (Le.,

The Communication Partner Scheme: A project to develop long‐term, low‐cost access to conversation for people living with aphasia

Background: People with long‐standing aphasia and other stroke‐related impairments have difficulty accessing opportunities for conversation and social inclusion. This paper outlines the first 3 years of an ongoing project that has provided an innovative service for people with long‐standing aphasia who would not typically be accessing therapy or local support networks. We are grateful to the Henry Smith Charity who funded the first three years of this project. We would also like to thank the people with aphasia, referring therapists, and volunteers who contributed to the scheme and the ideas developed in this paper. Finally we acknowledge the work of the Aphasia Institute, Toronto, and Jon Lyon in inspiring the original idea for the project. Aims: The project aimed to set up, deliver, and evaluate a home‐based Conversation Partner Scheme to individuals with long‐term aphasia. Methods and Procedures: The paper reports on the processes involved in generating referrals, and recruiting, training, matching, and supporting the volunteer conversation partners who took part in the project. We report findings from 72 pairs of conversational partners who met for a period of 6 months. One member of each pair was a trained volunteer and the second was a partner with aphasia. Outcomes and Results: Informal evaluation of the project from the perspective of people with aphasia, referring therapists, and participating volunteers revealed a range of positive outcomes. These included changes in confidence and communication for people with aphasia, extension of long‐term service options for therapists, and development of communication and life skills for volunteers. Conclusions: This project shows how trained and supported volunteers can extend the services and opportunities for people living with ongoing aphasia. It offers an exciting means of implementing healthcare policy for people living with long‐term conditions.

Values in practice and practising values.

UNLABELLED This paper first explores evidence that speech-language pathologists are experiencing dissatisfaction with their roles and then argues that one source of dissatisfaction may be in a mismatch between personal and organisational values. In order to clarify their notion of values, the authors next present a model that outlines various levels at which values operate in therapy and show how values pervade all aspects of practice. The paper then offers some practical examples of how a new organisation has tried to address overtly the implementation of values in practice, with suggestions for how other practitioners might go about making their own personal and organisational values more explicit. The paper ends with a few caveats about the difficulties and dangers of attending to values and conclude with why it is a beneficial endeavour. LEARNING OUTCOMES Participants will be able to (1) understand issues and practices that contribute to professional burnout; (2) describe a values-based framework for clinical practice; (3) understand the importance of concerning oneself with values, despite the difficulties in so doing; (4) explore some difficulties in adopting a medical model.

Impairment and Social Views of Speech-Language Pathology: Clinical Practices Re-Examined

The practices of speech-language pathologists (SLPs) are many and vaned. So much so that there have been complaints in the profession that there are too many things to choose from, with too little attention to how one should go about making these choices or the impact of such choices on our service provision (Damico, 1993; Dejoy, 1991; Kent, 1990). Take three clinicians who have just had a child referred to them for lack of responsiveness in the classroom. The first administers a set of standardised language tests, discovers an auditory processing problem, carries out therapy lessons involving sound blending and word identification in noisy conditions, and finds, at the end of the therapies, that the child has improved considerably. The therapies worked. The second analyses a language sample of the child’s language, discovers a syntax and discourse problem, administers therapy to give child models and practice on the creation of well-formed sentences and discourse, and also finds, at the end of the therapies, that the child has improved considerably. These therapies also worked. The third cliniaan administers a battery of tests, some having to do with processing, the others having to do with knowledge, discovers the child has difficulties in both areas, works on all areas at the same time, and finds, at the end of therapy, that the child can now perform normally on tasks measuring his sound blending, identification of words in noise, syntax, and discourse. These therapies worked too, but took a little longer, since there were more things to work on.

Communication access to organisations: Inclusionary practices for people with aphasia

Background: When speech and language therapists/pathologists talk about inclusion, they are usually referring to a client being included in events outside the clinic or the organisation that provides the speech and language therapy services. This article describes ways in which those providing services for and with people with aphasia can work to involve service users in their own organisations. A communication access pathway to inclusion and user involvement in organisations is presented. This draws on established methods in the field, as well as on methods and underpinning frameworks that require a shift in views about the nature of service provision. The pathway involves (1) targeting situations in which the “business” of the organisation takes place and then (2) designing ways of achieving communication access to those situations. Aims: The overall aim is to present ways in which an organisation can become more communicatively accessible to service users with aphasia and communication disabilities. We describe a range of involvement contexts and communication access conditions at Connect, a charity in the UK, where we have attempted to increase the engagement and power of people with aphasia in our organisations business. Main contribution: In order to show how organisations can create more inclusive practice, we present some of our own projects. We describe four different contexts in our organisation that we targeted for inclusion: (1) making therapy choices, (2) delivering therapy services, (3) providing courses to service providers, and (4) employment practices. For each of these contexts we present methods used to support the involvement of people with aphasia. Some types of support are tried and tested methods arising out of established theories, others are newer to the field and require a shift in thinking and values. Conclusions: In order to attain authentic communication access for people with aphasia, service providers need to look beyond established theories and practices. The result, judging from anecdotal evidence as well as evidence from qualitative evaluation, suggests that creating communication access in a service organisation can serve as a powerful means for involving people with aphasia and in so doing can improve on the services provided to them.

Using partners' autobiographical reports to develop, deliver, and evaluate services in aphasia

Four women whose husbands had aphasia were asked to talk about their lives in several in-depth interviews. Themes from their accounts were used to plan, deliver, and evaluate a support course. Themes from their initial interviews were used to create a course plan containing skill training, provision of information, and discussion topics. Themes emerging from their reports during course discussions provided a means for participants to explore and problem-solve their current issues. Evaluation of the course was based on themes drawn from two post-course interviews. Findings suggest that (1) aphasia affected these four participants differently, (2) themes from autobiographical reports were useful in planning content of a course to assure its relevance, (3) issues raised by participants during the course served to assure course relevance in its delivery, and (4) autobiographical descriptions offered a way of discovering whether and how the course experience had an ongoing impact on the lives of the participants. It is concluded that the collection and analysis of autobiographical reports provide an effective way to design, deliver and evaluate learning in a support course for partners of those with aphasia.

A dynamic phonological model derived from the intonational analysis of a jargon aphasic patient.

Abstract This study is a detailed phonological and intonational analysis of one subjects jargon productions. The cohesiveness and complexity of the intonation patterns and appropriateness of the gestures lead to the hypothesis that the jargon productions are due to phonological problems as opposed to semantic or syntactic problems. A psycholinguistic model containing a dynamic phonological component is hypothesized to account for this subjects jargon.

Describing the Unusual Behavior of Children with Autism.

The behaviors of children with autism have been described by professionals, by family members, and also by those with autism. This article analyzes four different types of reports that contain descriptions of those with autism: (1) case studies, (2) diagnostic reports and single-subject research studies, (3) family accounts, and (4) autobiographical descriptions. Authors describe the behaviors of those with autism differently depending upon their relationship with the person they are describing, their intended audience, their goals, and the genre they use for conveying their descriptions. Authors were found to use the following types of descriptions, to varying degrees in order to achieve their goals: (1) descriptions of what a child did on a particular occasion; (2) descriptions of what a child typically does or did; (3) descriptions of what a child should have done; (4) descriptions of how behavior was experienced by a child or family member; (5) descriptions of how a third party reported a behavior; (6) metaphoric descriptions of behaviors; and (7) descriptions of how behaviors mesh with traits often associated with autism. A detailed examination of how behaviors of children with autism are described indicates that the way someone with autism is regarded and described is strongly related to what the describer wants to accomplish.