Word retrieval difficulties can affect individuals who have had strokes or head trauma (Goodglass & Wingfield, 1997) and to a lesser extent, typically aging adults. This can affect an individual's ability to name pictures accurately and quickly. Cues are used to help individuals with word retrieval difficulties in fmding specific words. Two commonly used cues are semantic and phonological cues. Semantic cues can be information about the word the person is trying to retrieve, such as its definition, and/or its functions. Phonological cues are usually the initial sound of a word that a person is attempting to retrieve. Previous research has suggested that both of these cues, in isolation, are effective in stimulating word retrieval during naming tasks (Li & Williams 1989; Stirnley & Noll 1991 ). However, research has not investigated the effects of combining these two cues during picture naming tasks. The current study observed participants under four different cueing conditions during a picture naming task with the Boston Naming Test. The four conditions include a control group (received no cues), a semantically cued group (received a semantic cue before being asked to name a picture), a phonologically cued group (received a phonological cue before being asked to name a picture), and a semanticallyphonologically cued group (received a semantic and phonological cue before being asked to name a picture). Each group was compared on number of items correctly named and response times. The results indicated that there was no statistically significant difference between the groups with regard to number of items named. There was a statistically significant difference found between the groups with regards to response times. These findings are discussed and compared to previous research and current word retrieval theories.

Afasi medför en språklig och kommunikativ begränsning för personer med afasi vid samspel med andra individer. Syftet med föreliggande studie är att undersöka interaktion mellan personer med afasi, samt mellan afasigruppsledare och deltagare i en afasigrupp under behandlingssituationer. Tre afasigrupper, med sammanlagt elva afasigruppsdeltagare och fyra afasigruppsledare deltog i föreliggande studie. Datainsamling skedde via videoupptagning samt ljudinspelning. Det insamlade materialet transkriberades och analyserades enligt samtalsanalytiska principer. Utöver videofilmning och ljudinspelning har deltagarna med afasi även testats med delar ur det neurolingvistiska testet A-ning. Resultat från föreliggande studie visar att utförandet av behandlingsövningar är föränderligt vid gruppintervention, där både afasigruppsdeltagare samt afasigruppsledare påverkar utförandet. Enligt tidigare forskning kan interaktion under intervention vanligen vara av institutionell karaktär. Gruppintervention i föreliggande studie har dock visat sig kunna avvika från detta system. Resultaten i föreliggande studie visar även att afasigruppsledaren använder sig av ett tydligare socialt fasadarbete under intervention i jämförelse med det sociala fasadarbetet mellan två afasigruppsdeltagare. Strategier som syftar till att stärka kommunikations- och språkförmåga hos afasigruppsdeltagaren har identifierats hos både afasigruppsledare och afasigruppsdeltagare i föreliggande studie. Föreliggande studie har gjort en beskrivning av hur interaktionen kan te sig vid behandling i afasigrupp. Emellertid finns ett fortsatt behov av att studera interaktion i afasigrupper för att synliggöra strategier som kan underlätta samspelet mellan samtliga samtalsdeltagare. / Aphasia is a language and communication impairment, which affects interaction with other individuals. The purpose of the present study is to investigate and describe interaction between people with aphasia and between the leaders and the participants in an aphasia group during treatment sessions. Three aphasia treatment groups, with a combined total of eleven aphasia group participants and four aphasia group leaders participated in the present study. Data was collected through audio and video recording. The recordings were transcribed and analyzed according to principles from Conversation Analysis. In addition to the video and audio recording, the participants with aphasia were also tested with parts of the Swedish neurolinguistic test A-ning. The results of the present study demonstrated that the execution of treatment tasks can change in interaction during group treatment sessions. Both aphasia group participants and aphasia group leaders were shown to have an influence on changing the characteristics of treatment tasks. Previous research has shown that interaction in intervention usually is institutional by nature. However, the interaction during group treatment in the present study was occasionally deviating from this system. The results of the present study also show that aphasia group leaders use face work more frequently in intervention, compared to the aphasia group participants. Strategies, which strengthen communication and language ability in persons with aphasia during interaction, are used by leaders as well as by participants in aphasia treatment groups. The present study has made a description of how interaction may appear in therapy in aphasia treatment groups. However, there is a continuous need to study interaction during aphasia treatment groups in order to identify strategies that may further facilitate interaction between all the participants in the group.

Correct Information Units (CIU) analysis is one of the few measures of discourse that attempts to quantify discourse as a function of communicating information efficiently. Though this analysis is used reliably as a research tool, most studies' apply CIUs to structured discourse tasks and do not specifically describe how raters are trained. If certified clinical speech-language pathologists can likewise reliably apply CIU analysis within clinical settings to unstructured discourse, such as the discourse of people with aphasia (PWA), it may allow clinicians to quantify the information communicated efficiently in clinical populations with discourse deficits. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to determine if using the outlined training module, clinicians are able to score CIUs with similar inter-rater reliability across both structured and unstructured discourse samples as researchers. Method: Four certified SLPs will undergo a two-hour training session in CIU analysis similar to that of a university research staffs' CIU training protocol. Each SLP will score CIUs in structured and unstructured language samples collected from individuals diagnosed with aphasia. The SLP' scores within the structured and unstructured discourse samples will be compared to those of a university research lab staffs'. This will determine (1) whether SLPs can reliably code CIUs when compared with research raters in a lab setting when both using the same two-hour CIU training and resources allotted; (2) whether there is a significant difference in reliability when structured and unstructured discourse is analyzed.

The single subject alternating treatment design experiment reported here compared the effectiveness of pencil-and-paper versus computerized communication treatment for neurologically impaired adults. Five stroke patients receiving outpatient speech/language treatment (ages 51-72) served as subjects. One subject completed the experiment as designed and clearly supported the hypothesis that a higher number of correct responses would be produced using the computer generated exercises than the pencil-and-paper version. Two subjects were unable to demonstrate improvement using the experimental treatment program and the other two subjects were unable to master keyboarding skills necessary to use the computer effectively. However, four out of five subjects preferred using the computer even though it did not result in improved performance. Details of specific subjects' performance, and benefits and cautions regarding computer use are discussed. Results suggest that adequate receptive language skills favor effective computer use while impulsivity and visual spatial deficits may be expected to interfere. Careful matching of treatment task to the individual is important; if the task is too easy or too difficult potential benefit of computer use may be masked. The study also supports the finding that computer use is a highly motivating treatment technique for some patients and may be of benefit even if improved task performance does not result. Suggestions for further research include comparison of computerized versus non-computerized treatment for a greater variety of tasks, careful task analysis of currently available software, examination of techniques for training the mechanics of computer use, examination of specific subject characteristics which correlate with successful use of the computer, and determination of which aspect of computer use, specific feedback or improved motivation, is responsible for improved performance. / Graduation date: 1992

Background: The speech- and language deficit aphasia affects 12 000 persons annually in Sweden. Aphasia is caused by injury in the brain and the most common etiology is stroke. According to the tool for describing and assessing aphasia, A-FROM (Kagan et al., 2008), the four following aspects of aphasia need to be considered: severity of aphasia, participation in life situations, communication and language environment and personal factors. Several different interventions and treatments can be performed in every domain. There is scientific evidence for interventions performed by speech and language pathologists; however, the question is yet being discussed since results are unambiguous. Purpose: The main purpose of this study is to investigate which aphasia interventions performed by speech and language pathologists that are supported by evidence. A further purpose is to visit clinical practices to obtain data concerning how speech and language pathologists work with persons with aphasia. Method: Systematic search for literature was executed in seven medical databases. Articles that met certain criteria were graded regarding evidence. The authors additionally made visits to speech and language pathologists at a hospital Svealand, Sweden, for observation and interviewing of speech and language pathologists. Results and conclusions: The level of evidence for interventions varies. No intervention is investigated in more than three included studies and the number of participants is often small. Recommendations for clinical work can be given based on evidence from the included studies. The one intervention that was being studied by the most studies is CIAT/CILT. Interventions targeting expressive language, in particular word retrieval, have the strongest support in evidence. / Bakgrund: Språkstörningen afasi drabbar 12 000 personer årligen i Sverige. Afasi är en förvärvad språkstörning och orsakas av en skada i hjärnan, vanligaste orsaken är stroke.  Enligt ett verktyg för att beskriva och bedöma afasi, A-FROM (Kagan et al. 2008), kan man se till fyra aspekter av afasin: afasisvårigheter, delaktighet i vardagliga situationer, språklig och kommunikativ omgivning samt personliga faktorer. Inom varje domän kan flera olika typer av logopedisk intervention och behandling genomföras. Vetenskaplig evidens stödjer effekt av logopedisk intervention men diskussion pågår då resultaten inte är entydiga. Forskning på området är inte heller entydig kring vilken typ av intervention som har mest evidens att ge effekt. Syfte: Studiens huvudsyfte är att genom granskning av de senaste årens forskning besvara vilka logopediska afasiinterventioner som stöds av evidens. Ett ytterligare syfte är att göra besök i klinisk verksamhet för att inhämta data kring hur logopeder arbetar med personer med afasi. Metod: Systematiska litteratursökningar genomfördes i sju medicinska databaser. Artiklar som uppfyllde uppsatta inklusionskriterier evidensgraderades. Vidare besöktes ett sjukhus i Svealand för auskultation på och intervjuer med legitimerade logopeder. Resultat och slutsats: Studien visade på att afasiinterventioner har varierande grad av evidens. Varje typ av intervention behandlades av endast en eller ett fåtal inkluderade artiklar som ofta hade få försöksdeltagare. Förslag på rekommendationer för kliniskt arbete kan utfärdas utifrån inkluderade studier och deras evidensgrad. Den enskilda interventionen som studerats av flest inkluderade studier (tre studier) är CIAT/CILT. Starkast stöd i evidens har träning av expressiva förmågor, främst ordmobilisering.

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