This paper uses Conversation Analysis to examine four dyads of speech-generating device (SGD) mediated interaction involving two non-speaking children (Steve and Lucas) with severe physical impairments and intellectual disability. Participation in interaction with an SGD is often hard work. For example, turn production is prolonged in time (Savolainen et al., 2020) which affects temporality and sequentially, and the vocabulary is chosen and arranged by someone else. Embodied resources may be quicker and easier to use, but in the long run, SGD-mediated interaction can enhance non-speaking participants opportunities to participate in interaction (Caron & Light, 2016).
The video recordings (5 hr 46 min) were collected at Lucas’ and Steve’s schools in Sweden between May to November 2018. The first 30 minutes of every session were transcribed and screened for sequences where initiatives by the communication partner’s were followed by a contribution with the child’s’ SGD. We identified 134 sequences, and they were analysed for practices that mobilised the child’s SGD use.
The analysis showed that a combination of different practices mobilised SGD-mediated contributions: (a) environmental arrangements, (b) explicit embodied practices, (c) features of linguistic and prosodic resources, and (d) shifts from spoken turns that constructed an epistemic asymmetry to turns that increased the deontic pressure to use the SGD. Response mobilisation in SGD-mediated interaction involving beginner non-speaking users with intellectual disability appeared as joint communicative projects achieved within extended interactional sequences. These results indicate that non-speaking children with intellectual disability who are beginner SGD users need communication partners who show enhanced other-orientedness and responsiveness, and who use multimodal practices in motivating and joyful activities.
References
Caron, J. G. and J. Light (2016). "Social media experiences of adolescents and young adults with cerebral palsy who use augmentative and alternative communication." International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology 19(1): 30-42.
Savolainen, I., et al. (2020). "The structure of participants’ turn-transition practices in aided conversations that use speechoutput technologies." Augmentative and alternative communication 36(1): 17-30.
Newcastle, 2022.