How Therapists' Conceptual Perspectives Influence Early Intervention Evaluations

Abstract

Portions of this paper were presented at The Occupational Science Symposium X, March 21, 1997, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California. Occupational scientists are committed to developing a rich understanding of how occupation is enacted and how that knowledge can be used by occupational therapists to inform their work with patients. This paper describes two different practice perspectives that were used during the evaluation process in a pediatric setting. This type of description provides an understanding of how the occupational therapists framed their approach to the evaluation encounter and constructed their actions and behaviors in order to successfully enact the approach. In these ways the therapists reflected their understanding of their occupation. Four therapists were followed using a qualitative inquiry while they conducted the evaluations. Findings indicated that therapists approaches were representative of two distinct models, either medical or occupation based. The language and actions of therapists were examined to further understand how each approach guided the kinds of information that therapist attended to, collected and acted upon. Indications were that therapists' conceptual approach served to focus their interactions and resulted in different kinds of information being solicited and explored during the evaluation session even when the therapists were using the same standardized evaluation tool.