Audio Recordings Of Interactions Research Articles

Šeimų kalbų politika: latvių kalbos kaip paveldėtosios išlaikymas diasporoje

This article explores the concept of family language policy in relation to child agency and parents’ discourse strategies in the context of the Latvian diaspora. Research is based on four interviews with parents from three countries: the United Kingdom, Norway and Greece. Respondents were recruited through Saturday/Sunday schools in the diaspora, addressing Latvian speakers who work there or whose children attend these schools. Both parents of all four families analysed in this study use Latvian at home. Data were collected using the Zoom platform during spring 2023 and are part of a larger study about family language policies in the diaspora. Currently, data are also gathered using methods such as audio recordings of interactions between parents and children and online classroom observations in Latvian (Saturday) schools. The main research questions for this article are: which language ideologies underlie language practices (language choices) at home involving parents and children, and which parental discourse strategies are used in families with regard to the multilingual language practices of their children.

Fidelity and maintenance of motivational interviewing skills in diabetes prevention program coaches: a pilot study

ABSTRACT Motivational interviewing (MI) is an effective counseling style for changing lifestyle behaviors. The purpose of this study was to pilot a brief MI workshop on non-healthcare practitioners to deliver a community-based diabetes prevention program. Participants (n = 5) attended a two-day MI workshop, shadowed an expert coach delivering the diabetes prevention program, and finally, were shadowed by the expert coach and received feedback. Participants pre- and post-workshop MI skills were assessed, participants’ satisfaction with the workshop was recorded, and their delivery of the program using MI was assessed using a random selection of participants’ audio recordings of interactions with client. The primary outcome was whether coaches were able to maintain a level of client-centered MI skills for the six months post-training, as assessed by the Motivational Interviewing Competency Assessment (MICA). One session with one client per month for coaches’ first six months post-training was coded. Counseling scores were generated using the MICA. In general, coaches showed improvements from pre- to post-workshop, were satisfied with the training, and were using client-centered care over the six-month study period. The majority (80%) of all sessions were client-centered for all the MICA categories. This pilot study offers preliminary evidence that non-healthcare practitioners attending a brief MI training were able to deliver client-centered coaching in a community-based diabetes prevention program up to six months post-training without the use of any booster training sessions. This suggests that the training used within this study may be sufficient to train future non-healthcare practitioner diabetes prevention program coaches in the community.

Rainforest conversations

This study examines the conversations of 41 student teachers during visits to a designed rainforest in a greenhouse in a botanical garden in Sweden. The aim of this study is to explore the multimodal affordances of the rainforest for student teachers’ negotiations, and through this obtain an understanding of the potential this environment has for teaching and learning about plants, biodiversity, ecology and life on Earth. Data for this exploratory case study was collected through observations as well as audio recordings of interactions between student teachers. Data was analysed using multiple tools, including thematic analyses and social semiotics. The results show that the walk-through in the rainforest and the encounters with plants awaken curiosity, raise questions and bring about hypotheses. This has implications for and informs teaching about plants and the importance of plants for life on Earth.

Initial Design and Testing of Multiplayer Cooperative Game to Support Physical Activity in Schools

Recent studies have shown that children are not adequately physically active and there is a need to increase children’s physical activity. This study describes new opportunities and solutions for using existing games and gamification to increase physical activity among children in Sweden. We adopted the principles of Tic-Tac-Training to redesign, build, and test a classical multiplayer cooperative game, Battleship, to create a PA game that children experience as fun and engaging. The low fidelity prototype of the game was developed using an iterative game development life cycle and tested with 13 young male children aged 8–11 in a real-world informal setting. A mixed-method research approach was used to understand the users’ experiences and the impact of the Battleship-PA game on behavior change regarding physical activity. Research data were collected through audio recordings of interactions, direct observation, and a user experience questionnaire. The results of this study indicate both positive and negative feedback that can be used to improve the game and user experiences. The results from the unfiltered recordings revealed that both teams were competitive, cooperated within their team, and became excited whenever they destroyed opponent’s ships or were close to winning. However, the children felt bored and exhausted when many gamification tasks were repeated several times in a game session. Direct observation indicated that the children enjoyed the physical activities resulting from playing the game. However, participants who had not previously played the classical version of Battleship were confused about the objectives and concept of the game. The analysis of the user experience questionnaire indicated that most children found the game easy to play, motivating, engaging, interactive, fun, cooperative, competitive, and visually appealing. Furthermore, most children agreed that the game helped them to be physically active and strongly agreed that they enjoyed performing the physical activities in the game. Future work is needed to improve the game user interface, gamification elements, and prepare additional physical activity tasks for a rewarding experience.

#3079 Investigating the feasibility of automating the differential diagnosis of transient loss of consciousness

BackgroundThere are three common causes of Transient Loss of Consciousness (TLOC), syncope, epileptic and psychogenic nonepileptic seizures (PNES). Many individuals who have experienced TLOC initially receive an incorrect diagnosis and inappropriate treatment. Whereas syncope can be distinguished from the other two causes relatively easily with a small number of yes/no questions, the differentiation of the other two causes of TLOC is more challenging. Previous qualitative research based on the methodology of Conversation Analysis has demonstrated that epileptic and nonepileptic seizures are described differently when patients talk to clinicians about their TLOC experiences. One particularly prominent difference is that epileptic seizure descriptions are characterised by more formulation effort than accounts of nonepileptic seizures.AimThis research investigates whether features likely to reflect the level of formulation effort can be automatically elicited from audio recordings and transcripts of speech and used to differentiate between epileptic and nonepileptic seizures.MethodVerbatim transcripts of conversations between patients and neurologists were manually produced from video and audio recordings of interactions with 45 patients (21 epilepsy and24 PNES). The subsection of each transcript containing the patients account of their first seizure was manually extracted for the analysis. Seven automatically detectable features were designed as markers of formulation effort. These features were used to train a Random Forest machine learning classifier.ResultsThere were significantly more hesitations and repetitions in descriptions of first epileptic than nonepileptic seizures. Using a nested leave-one-out cross validation approach, 71% of seizures were correctly classified by the Random Forest classifier.ConclusionsThis pilot study provides proof of principle that linguistic features that have been automatically extracted from audio recordings and transcripts could be used to distinguish between epileptic seizures and PNES and thereby contribute to the differential diagnosis of TLOC. Future research should explore whether additional observations can be incorporated into a diagnostic stratification tool. Moreover, future research should explore the performance of these features when they have been extracted from transcripts produced by automatic speech recognition and when they are combined with additional information provided by patients and witnesses about seizure manifestations and medical history.

Becoming a clinician: Trainee identity formation within the general practice supervisory relationship.

Becoming a clinician is a trajectory of identity formation in the context of supervised practice. This is a social process where the supervisory relationship is key. Therefore, to know how to support identity formation of clinical trainees, it is necessary to understand how this happens within the supervisory relationship. Our aim was to develop a conceptualisation of trainee identity formation within the general practice supervisory relationship to aid its support. We took a critical realist approach using case study design and 'cultural worlds' theory as a conceptual frame. Each case comprised a general practice trainee and supervisor pair. Our data were weekly audiorecordings of interactions between trainee, supervisor and a patient over 12weeks augmented by post-interaction reflections and sequential interviews. We undertook interpretive analysis using dialogic methods focusing on the doing of language and the cultural discourses expressed. We identified three social discourses centring on: clinical responsibility; ownership of clinical knowledge, and measures of trainee competency. Versions of these discourses defined four trainee-supervisor relational arrangements within which trainee and supervisor assumed reciprocal identities. We labelled these: junior learner and expert clinician; apprentice assistant and master coach, and lead clinician and advisor. We found a trajectory across these identity arrangements. Behind this trajectory was an invitation by the supervisor to the trainee into the social space of clinician and a readiness of the trainee to accept this invitation. Congruence in supervisor and trainee positioning was important. In the supervisory relationship, trainee and supervisor adopted reciprocal identities. For trainees to progress to identity of 'lead clinician,' supervisors needed to invite their trainee into this space and vacate it themselves. Congruence between supervisor positioning of their trainee and trainee authorship of themselves was important and was aided by explicit dialogue and common purpose. We offer a model and language for trainees, supervisors and departments or schools to facilitate this.

A shifting standard: a stratified ideological ecology in a Birmingham Chinese complementary school

ABSTRACT This paper examines diasporic language ecology based on a sociolinguistic study of a Chinese complementary school (CCS) in Birmingham, England. The study applies a historical perspective to investigate local multilingual practices in relation to language ideology and identity. The discussion in this paper draws on heteroglossia to investigate language stratification in the CCS. It documents the impact of global mobility and socio-economic changes on shifting power relations among two Chinese language varieties (Putonghua and Cantonese) and English. Data for the discussion includes audio-recordings of interaction and interview as well as fieldnote vignettes. Findings show that (1) a stratified ideological ecology including ‘separate bilingualism’, ‘translanguaging’, ‘a preferred school-wide monolingualism’, and ‘a standard language ideology’ is dynamically constructed and negotiated in the school as a local heteroglossia; (2) At the intra-Chinese level, the Chinese language shift from Cantonese to Putonghua at global level is seeing its power in the local discourses of Putonghua becoming ‘the new diasporic standard’. This standardisation towards Putonghua, on one hand, is claimed and celebrated in the school by some Putonghua-speaking members as ‘practical’ and ‘useful’ for better communication; on the other side, it is also contested – sometimes silently – in tension-filled local interactions by groups of Chinese people who lack the resource of Putonghua in their repertoires. This complex and tension-filled standardisation of diasporic Chinese language provides new local discourses of global mobility and the ongoing conversion from linguistic standardisation to social inequality.

An interactional perspective on sound prolongation in multilingual encounters in residential care

ABSTRACTElderspeak refers to adapting one’s language to a  perceived language decline of an older interlocutor. Earlier studies have explored different features of elderspeak; some of these studies attribute positive outcomes to using elderspeak that facilitates communication, but other studies consider elderspeak a negative way of communicating that should be avoided. The aim of this study is to investigate a largely unexplored feature of elderspeak, namely sound prolongation in a multilingual context. There are five participants in this study: three carers and two care recipients in a residential care unit. The carers and care recipients have limited access to a shared spoken language. The data consist of video- and audio recordings of interaction between the participants. The recordings have been transcribed and analysed in accordance with Conversation Analytical methodology. The analysis shows that the carers use sound prolongation as part of their interactional repertoire in order to manage situations of distress. We conclude that in some distressful situations carers’ use of sound prolongation may help mitigating the care recipient’s emotional concerns since the source of agitations has been addressed properly. In other situations, the use of sound prolongation may lead to an escalation in distress, if the source of agitation is not addressed adequately. Our results bring to the fore that an interactional practice, such as the use of sound prolongation in the context of expressed distress must be interpreted in relation to the complexity of each and every situation participants find themselves in, their level of understanding, and the task/activity at hand.

Simulated patient and role play methodologies for communication skills training in an undergraduate medical program: Randomized, crossover trial.

Educators utilize real patients, simulated patients (SP), and student role play (RP) in communication skills training (CST) in medical curricula. The chosen modality may depend more on resource availability than educational stage and student needs. In this study, we set out to determine whether an inexpensive volunteer SP program offered an educational advantage compared to RP for CST in preclinical medical students. Students and volunteer SPs participated in interactions across two courses. Students allocated to SP interactions in one course participated in RP in the other course and vice versa. Audio recordings of interactions were made, and these were rated against criterion descriptors in a modified Calgary-Cambridge Referenced Observation Guide. Independent t-test scores comparing ratings of RP and SP groups revealed no significant differences between methodologies. This study demonstrates that volunteer SPs are not superior to RP, when used in CST targeted at preclinical students. This finding is consistent with existing literature, yet we suggest that it is imperative to consider the broader purpose of CST and the needs of stakeholders. Consequently, it may be beneficial to use mixed methods of CST in medical programs.

EXPERIENCE IN IMPLEMENTATION OF THE PROJECT «POLYCLINIC WITHOUT QUEUES» IN THE TOMSK REGIONAL ONCOLOGY CENTER

The problem of queues in polyclinics and hospitals is a deterrent to ensuring access to oncological care. In order to optimize anti-cancer control there were shortened timelines both for the diagnosis and the beginning of the specific treatment. Since 2012, in the Tomsk Regional Oncology Center a new concept of the polyclinic organization on the profile of «oncology» was formed. The key aspects of this concept were: 1) standardization of the medical staff work; 2) the rules for the routing of patients with the execution of the first medical appointment booking for visiting doctor through the registry, for the second visit - by an oncologist and with the differentiation of the streams of patients for medical care in the framework of MHI and medical services on a fee basis; 3) intensification of the provision with outpatient specialized care with the staff reinforcement: the regime of the polyclinic is organized in two shifts and 6 days a week, the number of doctors and nurses is increased by 60.8%, the number of medical registrars - by 7 times. To coordinate their work, the position of the senior medical registrator was introduced; 4) modernization of all workplaces of doctors, nurses, medical registrars with the provision of modern medical equipment, communications and information support; 5) logistics of the registry: the division of its zone into a «front office» - were the office-medical registrator communicates with patients only as «face-to-face» and «call center» - with a dialogue by phone. 6) quality control of the clinic work with evaluation of video and audio recordings of interaction between registrars and patients, visitors questioning. 7) the reform of the oncological consultation on an ongoing basis regulations; 8) increasing the comfort of waiting for patients with the organization of comfortable seats, coolers with glasses, air conditioners, corporate identity and logo. The result of the implemented activities was a reduction in the start of specialized treatment by 68.3%, increased coverage of antitumor therapy by 16.4%, including among rural residents. This contributed to the improvement of the situation in a number of indices: the increase in the share of early forms of malignant neoplasms, active detectability by 21.6% and 164.7%, respectively, a decrease in one-year mortality rate, neglect by 25.2% and 8.6%, respectively. Population satisfaction with the provision of cancer care increased.

“Just because he's black”: Identity construction and racial humour in a German U-19 football team

Despite its status as the global game, football has been noted for having problems with racism, and yet relatively little research has actually looked at this topic from a discourse analytical perspective. This paper addresses this gap by exploring the use of racial humour in a German male under-19 football team. Drawing on audio-recordings of interactions among the players on the sideline and substitutes’ bench during, before and after football matches and training, as well as interviews with players, and team observations, we analyse and critically discuss some of the ways in which team members make humorous comments about specific racial, ethnic or national groups when constructing and expressing team membership and negotiating their own and others’ identities within the team. Findings illustrate that, on the one hand, team members express their appreciation of the cultural diversity within their team in an attempt to maintain or enhance team cohesion, but on the other hand, they often use racial humour to create distinctive subgroups thereby fragmenting the team and assigning and foregrounding racial identities.

Justifying medication decisions in mental health care: Psychiatrists' accounts for treatment recommendations

Psychiatric practitioners are currently encouraged to adopt a patient centered approach that emphasizes the sharing of decisions with their clients, yet recent research suggests that fully collaborative decision making is rarely actualized in practice. This paper uses the methodology of Conversation Analysis to examine how psychiatrists justify their psychiatric treatment recommendations to clients. The analysis is based on audio-recordings of interactions between clients with severe mental illnesses (such as, schizophrenia, bipolar disorders, etc.) in a long-term, outpatient intensive community treatment program and their psychiatrist. Our focus is on how practitioners design their accounts (or rationales) for recommending for or against changes in medication type and dosage and the interactional deployment of these accounts. We find that psychiatrists use two different types of accounts: they tailor their recommendations to the clients' concerns and needs (client-attentive accounts) and ground their recommendations in their professional expertise (authority-based accounts). Even though psychiatrists have the institutional mandate to prescribe medications, we show how the use of accounts displays psychiatrists' orientation to building consensus with clients in achieving medical decisions by balancing medical authority with the sensitivity to the treatment relationship.

A random study of Staff Training Aimed at Reducing Re-arrest (STARR): using core correctional practices in probation interactions

The recent application of the risk–need–responsivity (RNR) model, in conjunction with core correctional practices, has offered promising results. In the present study, supervision officers were trained in core correctional skills and the RNR model. Supervision officers were randomly assigned to training groups and provided audio recordings of interactions with clients to assess their use of learned skills. The current study utilizes taped interactions between officers and offenders, individual-level offender data, and outcome/recidivism data to investigate the impact of the training regimen, which is the core focus of this paper. Trained probation officers demonstrated greater use of the skills taught during training and their clients had lower failure rates. These findings suggest that providing Staff Training Aimed at Reducing Re-arrest (STARR) training to community supervision officers can impact the officers’ use of important correctional skills and improve client outcomes.

Translanguaging in Self-Access Language Advising: Informing Language Policy

This study investigates language advising in a self-access center (SAC) with the purpose of informing language policy. This center is located in a new Japanese university and has shifted from an initially teacher-imposed ‘English-only’ language policy into one which encourages “translanguaging” (Blackledge & Creese, 2010, p. 105) between the students’ and center advisors’ (termed as mentors in this center) L1 (Japanese) and their L2 (English). Data from audio-recordings of interaction with advisors and students and between students themselves, interviews with mentors, and student questionnaires all reveal how translanguaging occurs in practice and how it helps to create a learning space in which the “local, pragmatic coping tactics” (Lin, 2005, p. 46) of code-switching offer a more viable approach for learning than under its initial monolingual policy. Mentor interviews and student questionnaires indicate generally positive attitudes towards translanguaging; however, some students still favor an ‘English-only’ policy. Conclusions reveal that a looser language policy in the center is emerging in which mentors now guide students towards their own individualized language policies. It is argued in this paper that this “code choice” (Levine, 2011) in language use is therefore aligned more closely to the principles of student-direction in self-access use.

Analysing Bilingual Classroom Discourse

The present paper analyses and evaluates spoken discourse in the bilingual classroom at Damascus University. It looks at the mechanism of classroom interaction: the use of questions, initiations, repetitions and expansions. Although this paper deals with classroom interaction at Damascus University, it is believed that the results arrived at may be of a more general interest. Video- and audiorecordings of interaction in six EFL classrooms at the ESP Centre, Damascus University are examined in detail. The findings of this research show that classroom language is artificial; this can be exemplified by the teacher's simplified input, his use of display questions that restrict students' responses and his greater number of initiations. This type of discourse is usually described as ‘artificial’, ‘contrived’ and deliberately ‘planned’ for practising the language. It contrasts with other types of language produced in real communicative discourse described as ‘natural’ or ‘authentic’. Given this, EFL learners find themselves unable to assign any communicative value to the forms of the language they learn through controlled interaction. Consequently, this paper suggests ways of improving spoken discourse in the EFL classroom to make it less artificial and more genuine.

Technical Notes on Audio Recording

Conversation analysts, discourse analysts, ethnographers, linguists, and rhetoricians often use audio recordings of interactions as a primary means of gathering and analyzing data. Although the level of attention to the details of the recorded data differs based on researcher orientation, we believe that all researchers relying on audio recordings can benefit from a basic understanding of field audio-recording equipment and techniques. We begin with a general discussion of practical issues regarding equipment selection (to match needs and budget) and setup for both ambient room recording and telephone recording. We then move to a more technical discussion of how recording and signal variation, device speed, and tape properties can affect the quality of the recording and the reliability and longevity of recorded data. We conclude with a brief checklist of suggestions and precautions.

Settlement policies and the transformation of traditional economies∗

Despite its status as the global game, football has been noted for having problems with racism, and yet relatively little research has actually looked at this topic from a discourse analytical perspective. This paper addresses this gap by exploring the use of racial humour in a German male under-19 football team. Drawing on audio-recordings of interactions among the players on the sideline and substitutes’ bench during, before and after football matches and training, as well as interviews with players, and team observations, we analyse and critically discuss some of the ways in which team members make humorous comments about specific racial, ethnic or national groups when constructing and expressing team membership and negotiating their own and others’ identities within the team. Findings illustrate that, on the one hand, team members express their appreciation of the cultural diversity within their team in an attempt to maintain or enhance team cohesion, but on the other hand, they often use racial humour to create distinctive subgroups thereby fragmenting the team and assigning and foregrounding racial identities.