Cultural and Linguistic Practice with Children with Developmental Language Disorder: Findings from an International Practitioner Survey.

BACKGROUND: The cultural and language diversity across many European countries presents a range of challenges and opportunities for speech and language therapists and other practitioners working with children with developmental language disorders (DLD) and their families. OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to explore practitioners' perceptions of cultural and linguistic differences in response to children with DLD across different countries. METHODS: A survey was developed by practitioners and researchers working with children with DLD across Europe and beyond as part of the work of Cost Action IS1406. Data from 1,358 practitioners from 8 European countries - Ireland, UK, Bulgaria, Poland, Croatia, Spain, Norway and Sweden - and 2 neighbour countries - Turkey and Lebanon - were included in the present analyses, which address two groups of questions. The first focuses on practitioners' perceptions of the way that parents think about cultural differences and their relationship to language development in their children. The second concerns the extent to which practitioners consider themselves to have the skills to work with children from other cultures and using different languages. RESULTS/CONCLUSIONS: Most countries present a similar profile with intermediate results about their perception of cultural issues, but Lebanon and Turkey are the group with the most positive responses. In terms of bilingual issues most practitioners indicated that they only worked in their country's primary language. The only country where this was not the case was Lebanon. Professionals from Spain and Lebanon form a subgroup in terms of their confidence to work with different cultural/language groups. The paper highlights both the universal importance of cultural and linguistic competence in managing young children's needs and indicates that in most cases professionals do not think they have the necessary expertise to work with cultural and linguistic diversity.

Telepractice as a Reaction to the COVID-19 Crisis: Insights from Croatian SLP Settings.

Telepractice facilitates services in exceptional settings and situations. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is certainly such a situation. Due to pandemic-related restrictions, speech-language pathologists (SLPs) needed to adopt new approaches to their professional functioning. The aim of the paper is to examine SLP professionals' perceptions and application of telepractice in SLP settings in Croatia during the COVID-19 pandemic. Two hundred and fifty-five SLPs completed an online survey. The results demonstrated that most SLPs had provided direct online therapy, mainly those employed in health care and private practice. The chief reasons for clients' refusal of therapy delivered via telepractice included the lack of equipment, insufficient independence, and doubts on the effectiveness of telepractice. Although only 3% of SLPs had acquired some formal knowledge of telepractice before the pandemic, over 70% expressed satisfaction with telepractice because it allowed them to provide undisturbed clinical services in an exceptional situation.

Working with the parents and families of children with developmental language disorders: An international perspective.

BACKGROUND: The relationship between parental input and child language development has had a complex history. It has become clear that indirect parent training for the parents of children with delayed language development is an important feature of interventions offered by speech and language therapists in the anglophone countries. Yet we know less about how this type of approach is realised in other countries. METHODS: In this paper we report the results of a survey of practice undertaken as part of the work of COST Action IS1406, a European Union (EU) funded research network. The focus of this paper is specifically on parent-related questions and responses referring to children under the age of twelve. The survey was devised by members of the Action and circulated electronically during the summer of 2017. In all, 4024 practitioners responded from 60 countries, the majority of whom came from EU member countries. FINDINGS: Respondents to the survey indicated that indirect therapy is commonly carried out via the parent in the early years and via teachers later. A range of professional groups, in addition to speech and language therapists, is likely to adopt this approach; including teachers, pedagogues and psychologists. A variety of interventions is reported, some of which have a reasonable evidence-base underpinning them. It is interesting to see the widespread involvement of fathers and other family members in interventions. Finally, the fact that practitioner characteristics (age, experience, location of practice etc.) are not related to the use of indirect techniques points to the universal recognition of the value of these approaches. CONCLUSIONS: Despite the very different traditions in the practice of intervention across countries, there is clearly a widespread recognition of the importance of indirect approaches to intervention and specifically those focusing on parents. The mixture of family members being involved in interventions is a very promising indication of the role sharing commonly associated with the contemporary family. Yet the number of specific intervention approaches identified is relatively small given the number of respondents. There is a need for a better understanding of what exactly practitioners are doing when they involve parents in intervention or carry out parent-child interaction interventions and how well these interventions work in routine practice. This also has implications for the application of evidence-based practice and the precise nature of the interventions concerned (advice to parents, video interaction training etc.).