Clinical Pragmatics Research Articles

Current practices of Portuguese speech-language pathologists with preschool-age children with pragmatic impairment: A cross-sectional survey.

This study aims to investigate the practice patterns used by Portuguese speech-language pathologists (SLPs) with preschool-age children with pragmatic impairment and to identify the actual need(s) perceived by SLPs in this field. A total of 351 SLPs responded. The results reveal that 81.5 per cent of the respondents (n=286) reported working or had previously worked with preschool-age children with pragmatic impairment arising from autism spectrum disorder, developmental language disorder, or both. Considering the clinical practice, similarities and differences were found, many of which are due not to the inherent characteristics of each disorder but to the scarcity of research in clinical pragmatics. These results are also reflected in the needs perceived by SLPs and the degree of confidence with which they work with these children. Implications for clinical practice and directions for future research are discussed.

A tutorial on discourse analysis in healthy and pathological ageing.

Age is a key factor when dealing with language and speech disorders, as it entails a progressive loss of neuroplasticity even in healthy individuals. Apart from this, ageing also affects our word-retrieval abilities, and thus, our discursive skills, particularly in people suffering from neurodegenerative diseases. Therefore, descriptions and/or measures of communicative performance always need to be interpreted through the lens of variation across the lifespan. This paper's main objective is to create a general tutorial for researchers willing to start delving into discourse analysis, both in healthy and pathological ageing. An eight-step tutorial on discourse analysis in the elderly is presented. Each of these steps starts with general recommendations and progresses to more specific topics that may be relevant when conducting this type of research. All of the steps have been extrapolated from an extensive literature review on discourse analysis. This work presents an easy-to-follow, step-by-step tutorial on discourse analysis in the elderly. It is aimed at clinical researchers who are taking their first steps in discourse analysis.It may also be useful for those who are already familiar with the methodology but may be interested in reading a general overview on the topic. Moreover, it offers new insights into the following topics: types of research questions, advantages and disadvantages of the different research methodologies and ethical considerations for data production in clinical linguistics. Discourse analysis in the elderly is a highly complex issue that may require researching from different approaches and disciplines. This implies following a well-planned and thorough process, which we have detailed through the following eight steps: (i) reviewing literature; (ii) formulating the research question; (iii) designing the study; (iv) producing data; (v) selecting technological tools for data treatment; (vi) transcribing the corpus; (vii) annotating the corpus and (viii) analysing and interpreting the results. What is already known on the subject Approaches in discourse analysis in elderly adults, and particularly, in people suffering from dementia have already been analysed by previous researchers and categorised into three main trends: the quantitative-experimental approach, the qualitative-naturalistic approach and an in-between path, the quantitative-naturalistic approach. Also, several handbooks on general discourse analysis have presented comprehensive revisions on potential resources and methodologies that can be applied to researching discourse in elderly populations. What this paper adds to existing knowledge This paper takes these three main approaches and analyses how the most recent research on language in ageing and dementia fits into them. Furthermore, it reviews the advantages and disadvantages each of them may bring for beginners in the field of discourse analysis. Moreover, it adds some studies that may fit into a fourth approach: the qualitative-experimental. This article also presents information about several of the main steps when analysing data from the pragmatic perspective: the formulation of the research question, data production and the transcription/annotation process. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work? This work has been devised for linguists who may want to read a systematization of the steps for analysing discourse in elderly populations. It may also be of interest to specialists from different fields such as speech therapy, psychology, gerontology or neurology who desire to start applying methods from discourse analysis in their work and aim to have a comprehensive scope of the main research trends within the field of clinical pragmatics.

Defisit Tindak Tutur Penderita Skizofrenia di Balikpapan: Kajian Pragmatik Klinis

This study aims to examine the form of speech act deficit and conversation structure deficit in the speech of schizophrenia patients at Klinik Ego Balikpapan. This research is qualitative research with a clinical pragmatics approach. The research location is at Klinik Kesehatan Jiwa Ego Balikpapan. This research's data collection technique is free listening (SBLC). The data analysis technique is through data collection, reduction, presentation, analysis, and conclusion. The results of the research on the form of speech act deficit of schizophrenia patients: (1) descriptive locution deficit, (2) assertive illocution deficit, and (3) declarative illocution deficit. The conversational structure deficits found: were (1) conversational turns, (2) adjacent pairs, and (3) pauses. Patients experience pragmatic deficits with a pattern of not being able to speak with a completely clear sentence pronunciation, often repeating sentences, and their speech is slightly slower than normal people in general. However, interlocutors can accept the communication skills of schizophrenic patients because they have good information power. Patients can be invited to talk even though the answer response is chattering according to their wishes as a form of their delusions, and there are some utterances with words with unclear meanings.

Review of Schneider & Ifantidou (2020): Developmental and Clinical Pragmatics

Review of Schneider & Ifantidou (2020): Developmental and Clinical Pragmatics

Clinical negotiation

Clinical pragmatics is a sub-discipline of clinical linguistics and deals with the various situations in which communication can malfunction or function insufficiently. It also focuses on the various reasons that may cause poor communication. The current research is a theoretical survey that attempts to shed some light on what clinical pragmatics is and what is its scope. This field is also covered in clinical linguistics in general. More specifically, the current study attempts to answer the following question: What are the basic principles of clinical pragmatics? In this regard, and to achieve the objective of this study, a theoretical survey was conducted to clearly clarify the basic concepts of the subject under scrutiny. The paper concluded that the field of clinical pragmatics is a troubled field because of the incompatibility between pragmatics.

Research in Clinical Pragmatics, edited by Louise Cummings

Research in Clinical Pragmatics, edited by Louise Cummings

Empirical validation of a novel operationalization of the expression of emotion: A case of synchronization of relative pitch height and evaluative language across elements of discourse structure in a narrator with Broca’s aphasia

Empirical validation of a novel operationalization of the expression of emotion: A case of synchronization of relative pitch height and evaluative language across elements of discourse structure in a narrator with Broca’s aphasia

Behavioral and Neural Evidence on Pragmatic Processing: A Foreword to XPRAG.it

Behavioral and Neural Evidence on Pragmatic Processing: A Foreword to XPRAG.it

Theory of mind in utterance interpretation: the case from clinical pragmatics.

The cognitive basis of utterance interpretation is an area that continues to provoke intense theoretical debate among pragmatists. That utterance interpretation involves some type of mind-reading or theory of mind (ToM) is indisputable. However, theorists are divided on the exact nature of this ToM-based mechanism. In this paper, it is argued that the only type of ToM-based mechanism that can adequately represent the cognitive basis of utterance interpretation is one which reflects the rational, intentional, holistic character of interpretation. Such a ToM-based mechanism is supported on conceptual and empirical grounds. Empirical support for this view derives from the study of children and adults with pragmatic disorders. Specifically, three types of clinical case are considered. In the first case, evidence is advanced which indicates that individuals with pragmatic disorders exhibit deficits in reasoning and the use of inferences. These deficits compromise the ability of children and adults with pragmatic disorders to comply with the rational dimension of utterance interpretation. In the second case, evidence is presented which suggests that subjects with pragmatic disorders struggle with the intentional dimension of utterance interpretation. This dimension extends beyond the recognition of communicative intentions to include the attribution of a range of cognitive and affective mental states that play a role in utterance interpretation. In the third case, evidence is presented that children and adults with pragmatic disorders struggle with the holistic character of utterance interpretation. This serves to distort the contexts in which utterances are processed for their implicated meanings. The paper concludes with some thoughts about the role of theorizing in relation to utterance interpretation.

INTERVENSI GURU TERHADAP EKSPRESI TUTUR SISWA TUNARUNGU

This study aims to describe teacher interventions in deaf students’ oral expressions,comprising those in speech acts, speech functions, and speech strategies. It employed thequalitative descriptive approach. The data comprised descriptive and reflective data. Theywere analyzed by means of pragmatics theory, especially clinical pragmatics. The findingsare as follows. First, interventions in speech acts include illocutionary acts, conversationcapabilities, understanding, and narration. Second, interventions in speech functionsinclude directive and facilitative interventions. Third, interventions in speech strategiesinclude context manipulation and pre-symbolic and minimum symbolic interventions.

Social Anxiety and Pragmatics in Autism Spectrum Disorders: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy and Its Relation to Speech-Language Pathology

In this review of basic principles of cognitive behavioral therapy, application to treatment of anxiety in autism spectrum disorders (ASD) is outlined and evidence for effectiveness presented. The links between social anxiety disorder and social communication impairment are explored, and the issues raised by applying principles drawn from psychology to clinical practice in speech-language pathology are discussed. Suggestions for clinical practice are offered, along with reflections on the potential for increased collaboration between cognitive behavioral therapists and speech-language pathologists (SLPs) to better serve individuals with ASD. Outcomes for individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) can be impacted by many factors, including co-morbid psychiatric factors. In working on clinical pragmatics with individuals on the autism spectrum, it is not uncommon to come across clients who have a clinical diagnosis of anxiety disorder. Often, the symptoms of that disorder are present primarily in social situations. The social piece creates a direct interface between speech-language pathologists (SLPs), as experts on pragmatic language and social communication, and psychologists, with expertise in psychological functioning and treatments for its disorders. Awareness of current literature and best practice in handling anxiety is relevant to our practice as SLPs, because social anxiety and communicative competence are logically connected, in that both deal with managing social situations. Effective treatments for anxiety exist within the psychiatric and psychological professions. In this review of recent cognitive behavioral therapeutic approaches for treatment of social anxiety in ASD, the strength of the evidence for effectiveness will be described and implications for clinical practice in speech-language pathology discussed.

Clinical pragmatics: A field in search of phenomena?

Since its inception as a branch of linguistic enquiry, pragmatics has been the focus of numerous debates about its scope of study. While such debates have brought about necessary refinement of core concepts, they have also resulted in uncertainty about exactly which linguistic phenomena are pragmatic in nature. This uncertainty has come to characterise the related discipline of clinical pragmatics, with many investigators labelling as ‘pragmatic’ behaviours that are not pragmatic on any reasonable interpretation of this term. In this paper, I examine a number of clinical studies in which behaviours have been incorrectly characterised as pragmatic. These studies will be classified according to several categories of error. The implications of these erroneous characterisations for the assessment and treatment of pragmatic language disorders will be discussed. Finally, a number of criteria are advanced which, it is expected, will constrain the tendency of clinicians and theorists alike to incorrectly identify behaviours as pragmatic.

Pragmatics and Adult Language Disorders: Past Achievements and Future Directions

In this article, the current state of our knowledge of pragmatic disorders in adults with language impairment is assessed. A brief historical background of clinical pragmatics is presented, and the place of adult language pathology within the development of this field is discussed. A comprehensive review is undertaken of pragmatic deficits in adults with language impairments of diverse etiologies. Specifically, pragmatic deficits are examined in adults with left-hemisphere damage, often resulting in aphasia, and in adults with right-hemisphere damage, traumatic brain injury, schizophrenia, and neurodegenerative disorders (principally, Alzheimer's disease). Although many pragmatic phenomena have been examined in these clinical populations, studies have also tended to neglect important areas of pragmatic functioning in adults with these disorders. Several such areas are identified within a wider discussion of how researchers and clinicians can best pursue future investigations of pragmatics in adults with language impairment.

PMT: Empirical Evidence and Clinical Pragmatics

PMT: Empirical Evidence and Clinical Pragmatics

How to Deal with Medical Narratives based on Controlled Natural Language Operated by an Ontology

Medical narratives entry is a major issue to be solved in developing an electronic medical record system operating in practice, as they are, in large part, described in a free-text format. The issue can be dealt with in three aspects: to improve the reusability by structuring medical narratives, to support clinical pragmatics in medical fields, and to reduce the burden of data entry. With the aspects having in mind, this paper purports to present an ontological method for better way of medical narratives entry. Methods: We developed an ontology for which medical knowledge is structurally represented. Then we can enter medical narrative texts with commands of the controlled natural language operable on the ontology model. Results: Many theoretical studies on free-text entry were reviewed, based on which an authoring and editing tool for natural language description operable on the ontology model has been developed and tested. The performance of the tool is satisfactory within the limit of the domain models we developed here. Conclusion: The results of this paper are contributive for clinicians to make an easy entry of medical narratives as far as the ontology model covers their knowledge domain. It is also expected that the cost in recording medical narratives might be considerably reduced and data quality can be improved.

Clinical Terminology: Why Is it so Hard?

Despite years of work, no re-usable clinical terminology has yet been demonstrated in widespread use. This paper puts forward ten reasons why developing such terminologies is hard. All stem from underestimating the change entailed in using terminology in software for 'patient centred' systems rather than for its traditional functions of statistical and financial reporting. Firstly, the increase in scale and complexity are enormous. Secondly, the resulting scale exceeds what can be managed manually with the rigour required by software, but building appropriate rigorous representations on the necessary scale is, in itself, a hard problem. Thirdly, 'clinical pragmatics'--practical data entry, presentation and retrieval for clinical tasks--must be taken into account, so that the intrinsic differences between the needs of users and the needs of software are addressed. This implies that validation of clinical terminologies must include validation in use as implemented in software.