Towards efficient, ecological assessment of interaction: A scoping review of co-constructed communication.

BACKGROUND: The complexity of communication presents challenges for clinical assessment, outcome measurement and intervention for people with acquired brain injury. For the purposes of assessment or treatment, this complexity is usually managed by isolating specific linguistic functions or speech acts from the interactional context. Separating linguistic functions from their interactional context can lead to discourse being viewed as a static entity comprised of discrete features, rather than as a dynamic process of co-constructing meaning. The ecological validity of discourse assessments which rely on the deconstruction of linguistic functions is unclear. Previous studies have reported assessment tasks that preserve some of the dialogic features of communication, but as yet, these tasks have not been identified as a distinct genre of assessment. We suggest the term 'co-constructed communication' to describe tasks which are specifically designed to capture the dynamic, jointly produced nature of communication within a replicable assessment task. AIMS: To identify and summarize how co-constructed communication has been assessed with individuals with non-progressive acquired communication disability regarding task design, measures and psychometric robustness. METHODS: A scoping review methodology was used to identity relevant studies. Systematic database searches were conducted on studies published before July 2021. Studies in the yield were assessed against eligibility criteria, with 37 studies identified as eligible for inclusion. MAIN CONTRIBUTION: This is the first time that co-constructed communication has been defined as a genre of discourse assessment for stroke and traumatic brain injury populations. Co-constructed communication has been assessed for 144 individuals with aphasia and 111 with cognitive-communication disability. Five categories of co-constructed communication tasks were identified, ranging in complexity. Variability exists in how these assessment tasks are labelled and measured. Assessment measures require further psychometric profiling, specifically regarding test-retest reliability and validity. CONCLUSIONS: Co-constructed communication is a discourse genre which offers researchers and clinicians a replicable method to assess language and communication in an experimentally rigorous way, within an ecologically valid context, bridging the gap between experimental and ecological assessment approaches. WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS: What is already known on this subject Standardized assessments of language skills and monologue offer reliable, replicable ways to measure language. However, isolating language from an interactional context fundamentally changes the behaviour under study. This raises questions about the ecological validity of the measures we routinely use to determine diagnoses, guide treatment planning and measure the success of treatment. What this study adds to the existing knowledge This review highlights studies that conceptualize, and often quantify, interaction by combining experimental rigour and aspects of everyday dialogue. This is the first time this genre of discourse assessment has been identified. We propose the term 'co-constructed communication' to describe this genre and provide an operational definition for the term. What are the practical and clinical implications of this study? Co-constructed communication assessment tasks require refinement, particularly regarding aspects of psychometric robustness. In the future, these tasks offer pragmatic, meaningful ways to capture the effect and impact of aphasia and cognitive-communication disability within interaction.

Measuring the interactions of people with dementia and their conversation partners: a preliminary adaption of the Kagan measures of support and participation in conversation.

OBJECTIVE: While dementia can negatively affect communication, positive interactions can be facilitated by the conversation partners of people with dementia. There are few assessment tools designed to evaluate the support provided by the conversation partner and the resulting participation of the person with dementia. This study reports on an adaptation of the Measure of Support in Conversation (MSC) and Measure of Participation in Conversation (MPC) scales for use with people with dementia and their conversation partners (the MSC Dementia and MPC Dementia, respectively) and investigates the inter-and intra-rater reliability of these adapted measures. METHOD: The MSC-D and MPC-D scales were adapted from the original MSC and MPC scales to reflect current knowledge of communication and interaction involving people with dementia. Audio recordings of a total of 25 casual conversations, lasting 5-10 min, between a person with dementia and familiar aged care staff were independently rated by two raters to investigate inter-rater reliability and by one rater on two separate occasions to investigate intra-rater reliability. RESULTS: ICC analyses on the MSC-D indicated good inter-rater reliability (ICC = 0.718-0.812) and intra-rater reliability (ICC = 0.628-0.760). The MPC-D had excellent inter-rater reliability (ICC = 0.904-0.945) and intra-rater reliability (ICC = 0.925-0.957). 93.6% of all ratings were within 0.5 of each other on a nine point scale from 0 to 4. CONCLUSION: The results provide preliminary support for the use of these adapted scales. Further research is required to investigate the validity and reliability of these scales using video recordings and across a wider range of communication genres.

Use of Transcription when Assessing Children's Speech: Australian Speech-Language Pathologists' Practices, Challenges, and Facilitators.

OBJECTIVE: There is currently limited knowledge on the useof transcription in the management of children with speech sound disorders (SSD) by speech-language pathologists in Australia. This study explored the use of transcription, the facilitators, and challenges of transcription use, and differences in the use of detailed transcription with various client groups. Method and Participants: Eighty-four participants (speech-language pathologists working in Australia) completed an online exploratory survey which included closed and open-ended questions. RESULTS: 95% of participants reported using transcription. The three most commonly reported strategies/resources were transcription charts (81%), self-practice (68%), and websites (42%). Transcription challenges included the use of two vowel notation systems, reduced proficiency in transcription, service delivery issues, sampling/recording issues, and issues with using transcription to communicate. Finally, results from this survey found that participants use detailed transcription more often when recording the speech of children with childhood apraxia of speech and craniofacial impairment compared to using transcription to document the speech of children who have SSD of unknown origin. Most participants (91%) had not attended transcription professional development. CONCLUSIONS: These findings have implications for the university training of speech-language pathologists and for the establishment of professional development courses for practising speech-language pathologists in Australia.

Communicative effectiveness of pantomime gesture in people with aphasia.

BACKGROUND: Human communication occurs through both verbal and visual/motoric modalities. Simultaneous conversational speech and gesture occurs across all cultures and age groups. When verbal communication is compromised, more of the communicative load can be transferred to the gesture modality. Although people with aphasia produce meaning-laden gestures, the communicative value of these has not been adequately investigated. AIMS: To investigate the communicative effectiveness of pantomime gesture produced spontaneously by individuals with aphasia during conversational discourse. METHODS & PROCEDURES: Sixty-seven undergraduate students wrote down the messages conveyed by 11 people with aphasia that produced pantomime while engaged in conversational discourse. Students were presented with a speech-only, a gesture-only and a combined speech and gesture condition and guessed messages in both a free description and a multiple-choice task. OUTCOMES & RESULTS: As hypothesized, listener comprehension was more accurate in the combined pantomime gesture and speech condition as compared with the gesture- or speech-only conditions. Participants achieved greater accuracy in the multiple-choice task as compared with the free-description task, but only in the gesture-only condition. The communicative effectiveness of the pantomime gestures increased as the fluency of the participants with aphasia decreased. CONCLUSIONS & IMPLICATIONS: These results indicate that when pantomime gesture was presented with aphasic speech, the combination had strong communicative effectiveness. Future studies could investigate how pantomimes can be integrated into interventions for people with aphasia, particularly emphasizing elicitation of pantomimes in as natural a context as possible and highlighting the opportunity for efficient message repair.

Delivery of Allied Health Interventions Using Telehealth Modalities: A Rapid Systematic Review of Randomized Controlled Trials.

Objectives: To determine whether allied health interventions delivered using telehealth provide similar or better outcomes for patients compared with traditional face-to-face delivery modes. Study design: A rapid systematic review using the Cochrane methodology to extract eligible randomized trials. Eligible trials: Trials were eligible for inclusion if they compared a comparable dose of face-to-face to telehealth interventions delivered by a neuropsychologist, occupational therapist, physiotherapist, podiatrist, psychologist, and/or speech pathologist; reported patient-level outcomes; and included adult participants. Data sources: MEDLINE, CENTRAL, CINAHL, and EMBASE databases were first searched from inception for systematic reviews and eligible trials were extracted from these systematic reviews. These databases were then searched for randomized clinical trials published after the date of the most recent systematic review search in each discipline (2017). The reference lists of included trials were also hand-searched to identify potentially missed trials. The risk of bias was assessed using the Cochrane Risk of Bias Tool Version 1. Data Synthesis: Fifty-two trials (62 reports, n = 4470) met the inclusion criteria. Populations included adults with musculoskeletal conditions, stroke, post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and/or pain. Synchronous and asynchronous telehealth approaches were used with varied modalities that included telephone, videoconferencing, apps, web portals, and remote monitoring, Overall, telehealth delivered similar improvements to face-to-face interventions for knee range, Health-Related Quality of Life, pain, language function, depression, anxiety, and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. This meta-analysis was limited for some outcomes and disciplines such as occupational therapy and speech pathology. Telehealth was safe and similar levels of satisfaction and adherence were found across modes of delivery and disciplines compared to face-to-face interventions. Conclusions: Many allied health interventions are equally as effective as face-to-face when delivered via telehealth. Incorporating telehealth into models of care may afford greater access to allied health professionals, however further comparative research is still required. In particular, significant gaps exist in our understanding of the efficacy of telehealth from podiatrists, occupational therapists, speech pathologists, and neuropsychologists. Protocol Registration Number: PROSPERO (CRD42020203128).

Applying systemic functional linguistics to conversations with dementia: the linguistic construction of relationships between participants.

Social isolation in dementia is a growing concern as the incidence and prevalence of dementing conditions is on the rise in many societies. Positive social interactions, which foster the construction and enactment of positive interpersonal relationships and therefore positive discursive identities, make an important contribution to emotional well-being. In this article, we investigate how two women diagnosed with dementia of the Alzheimer's type use language to relate to each other and two visiting graduate students. We use Systemic Functional Linguistics as an analytical framework, specifically investigating the use of vocatives and naming, and conversational moves and exchanges.

Lexical-semantic immaturities manifesting as grammatical disorders: evidence from a child language sample.

Given the growing evidence of the integral role that semantic development plays in normal child syntactic acquisition, it is very likely that lexical-semantic deficits can have ramifications for a child's grammar. This paper illustrates how semantics and syntax interact in a case study of a child, 5;3 years, with apparent grammatical deficits. Using concepts from Principles and Parameters Theory, a language sample analysis revealed that what appeared to be purely grammatical deficits arose via underlying lexical-semantic mechanisms. Language sample analyses to adequately guide intervention planning may thus need to move beyond superficial surface structures and utilize linguistic frameworks capable of addressing the interaction among language-internal components.

Conversational trouble and repair in dementia: Revision of an existing coding framework.

A decline in the effectiveness of everyday conversation is often observed for people with dementia. This study explored conversational trouble and repair between people with dementia residing in residential care and professional care staff. The aim was to examine the utility of an existing conversational trouble and repair framework by Watson, Carter and Chenery (1999) in a comparatively larger sample. Twenty conversations were coded for dementia-specific trouble and repair; however, the original framework could not adequately accommodate the variety of trouble and repair within the dataset. The data was subsequently used to inform a revised framework, which captures a wide spectrum of trouble and repair in dementia and offers more precise codes to researchers and clinicians working with this clinical population. Examples of divergent coding strategies between the original and revised framework are provided as well as examples of trouble and repair patterns observed in both carers and people with dementia.

Staging casual conversations for people with dementia.

Social isolation is a key concern for individuals with dementia in long-term care. A possible solution is to promote social interaction between residents. A first step toward facilitating positive relationships between residents with dementia is to understand the mechanisms behind their interactions with each other, and also how their relationships with each other are built through such interactions. Drawing on casual conversations between residents in a special care unit for dementia, this paper uses systemic functional linguistics to examine how people with dementia use language to enact and construct their role-relations with each other. Results suggest people with dementia are able and willing conversationalists. However, factors such as the extent of communication breakdown and compatibility of the interlocutors may influence whether positive relations develop or not. Casual conversation is suggested to be a promising activity to encourage positive interpersonal processes between individuals with dementia in residential care.