Conversational turn-taking and repair in fluent aphasia

Abstract

This study replicated and extended the previous investigation of conversational turn-taking in fluent aphasia by Schienberg and Holland. The present study analysed a series of casual conversations which were videotaped between two fluent aphasic speakers talking with each other, and with non-aphasic partners who varied with regard to clinical experience with aphasia and personal familiarity with the aphasic speakers. Analysis was based on transcription and examined general aspects of turn-taking, as well as turn allocation techniques and their success, with results being compared with those presented by Schienberg and Holland. Additionally, repair trajectories and their acceptance were analysed for each dyad. Results supported Schienberg and Holland's previous findings and conclusions with regard to the relative preservation of communicative competence in aphasia. Additionally, results suggest that measures of turn-taking allocation showed no effect of the familiarity of the partners. For some individuals, it was suggested that turn-taking techniques might be consistent across occasions of sampling, so long as the role relationship remains constant. Measures of repair showed no effect of familiarity, and varied across occasions of sampling.

Language, meaning, context, and functional communication

“…The analysis of turn-taking between speakers in a conversation allows the machinery of pragmatics to become visible, as turn-taking provides the structure for regulating the negotiation of who speaks when and for how long. Studies of conversation involving aphasic speakers have demonstrated their continued access to this turntaking machinery despite aphasia (Goodwin, 2003), although the repair of communication breakdown typically extends more frequently over a longer series of turns and involves greater participation of the communication partner Ferguson, 1994Ferguson, , 1998Laakso & Klippi, 1999;Perkins, Crisp, & Walshaw, 1999). Their continued access to the turntaking structure provides people with aphasia with an important communication resource, as they neither the speech pathologist nor Chris take a substantial turn -partly due to the rate of Jim"s delivery, which could be described as "press of speech.…”

Maintenance of speech in Parkinson’s disease: The impact of group therapy

“…Overlap was a frequent but brief event, consistent with the literature concerning typical speakers. 74,302 The rate of repair for the participants with aphasia was higher than that for the participants without aphasia.…”

“…300,301,303,306,307 The feasibility of quantifying overlap, repair, talking time, and topic setting in the communication disordered population has been established. 288,300,302,303,310 However, in the initial exploration of conversational behaviours, the inductive nature of CA allows for new phenomena to be observed 291 and for problems in interaction to be revealed by participant reaction rather than researcher judgement. 307 As such, CA reveals conversational behaviours of interest, that can then be quantified in order to enable comparison between participants and across time.…”

“…The communication partners' speaking rate was slower and their repair behaviour and total word count were reduced. 301,303 Similarly, Ferguson 302 used counts of the features of turn taking and repair to describe the conversations of people with aphasia. Two people with aphasia conversed with each other, an unfamiliar clinician, a lay speaker, and a familiar clinician.…”

“…In the speech-language pathology literature, there are also exploratory studies that have compared conversational behaviours across participants, across conversational partners, following intervention, and over time. 288,[300][301][302] Behaviours of the participants within the conversations, such as repair and contribution of words to the conversation, were identified and frequency counts of the behaviour of interest presented. 300,301,303 Rutter, 300 in a pilot study of three participants with multiple sclerosis, explored the combined use of qualitative and quantitative measures in describing the conversation of people with dysarthria.…”