Discourse/Conversation Analysis and Autism Spectrum Disorder.

Abstract

Qualitative research focused on autism spectrum disorders (ASD) is important, as it can refine understandings of particular issues related to ASD and be practically relevant provided that quality criteria are applied (Bolte 2014). Employing qualitative methods for the study of ASD is an important way of giving a ‘voice’ to participants and can be particularly useful for empowering vulnerable or disadvantaged people groups (Peters 2010). The field of mental health and disability generally is one that is mediated through language (Brown et al. 1996) and qualitative methods tend to focus on language use, specifically those using discourse or conversation analysis approaches. Quantitative evidence, whatever its form, provides important and valuable evidence about ASD. However, it is crucial that the field does not solely rely on a relatively narrow range of methodologies and forms of knowledge to inform us about such a complex and diverse condition. Qualitative methods are able to go beyond establishing the likelihood of associations between variables, towards understanding the nature of such associations and the complex processes that they may be interpreted to represent. More specifically, qualitative methods are able to go beyond what works to show how and why a particular practice is effective (Rhodes 2011), particularly when taking into account established quality criteria. In this special section, we focus specifically on discourse analysis and conversation analysis, which are languageoriented qualitative approaches that analyse what people actually do and say, as opposed to what they report that they do or say (McCabe 2006). The five included articles use discourse or conversation analysis in varying ways, and highlight how these analytic methods pursue robust validation procedures and focus on identifying systematic patterns of interaction grounded in natural data (McCabe et al. 2002) with built in quality criteria. Typically researchers applying discourse or conversation analysis use extensive corpora of audioor video-recordings of social interactions collected in natural settings (e.g., clinic, therapy session). Analysis then involves a close, inductive examination of the interactions of all the participants in that setting. Although discourse analysis and conversation analysis are similar approaches, and both fall broadly within the landscape of qualitative research in that they treat language as their central focus (Bryman 2008), there are some important practical and epistemological differences which dictate the nature of the questions asked and the specific analytic methods used. Conversation analysis (CA) is a qualitative approach that focuses on the study of interaction. The core aim of this approach is to examine the social organisation of activities that are produced in interaction through talk (Hutchby and Wooffitt 2008). In other words, CA aims to interrogate how people use language to perform certain social actions, such as excusing, inviting, complaining, & Michelle O’Reilly mjo14@leicester.ac.uk; mjo14@le.ac.uk