Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Pennsylvania, 1930.

Thesis (M.A.)--Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, 1992. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 108-114).

The use of oral narratives as a measure of language processing and production skills has been used with increasing frequency during speech and language evaluations. By analyzing narratives we have an insight into strategies that children use for organizing, comprehending, and producing language. Narratives also reveal how different cultural groups organize and make sense of their world. One of the shortcomings of the existing research on narratives is that it is limited in scope. That is, studies have primarily examined narrative development among Standard English (SAE) speaking children. Far less attention has been given to examining the narrative production of African American English (AAE) child speakers. Qualitatively the study design was drawn from an ethnographic perspective. African American subjects were selected from low income community of Springfield, Massachusetts, where subjects participated in two after school programs located a mile apart. Video taped and audio taped data were collected on site at the afterschool programs. A total of 15 subjects who met criteria for participation in the narrative activity were video and audio taped as the told personal stories to a familiar adult. All video tapes were transcribed for each child. A total of 71 narratives were subjected to analyses. Narratives were analyzed using five different procedures: thematic, componential, highpoint, story grammar, and a micro-sociolinguistic analysis. Among the findings were: (a) higher frequency of "topic centered" narratives than "topic associated" narratives, (b) production of a repertoire of narrative structures, (c) higher frequency of complete and complex structures than any other structures within story grammar analysis, and (d) higher frequency of the classic structure than any other structures within highpoint analysis. The clinical and theoretical implications with regard to deficit theory, Africanisms within narrative discourse, and educational and speech/language assessment for the AAE child speaker were also discussed.

The study investigated the nature of the listener confusion which occurs when Black South African English (BSAE) speakers communicate a list of common English words to speakers of standard South African (StdSAE) English. BSAE and StdSAE subjects were grouped into 10 dyads. BSAE subjects read 120 monosyllabic English words to StdSAE subjects. Written data of StdSAE subjects were analysed to determine patterns of success and failure in the communication of single word items by BSAE subjects. Specific difficulties with vowels, dipthongs and consonants are discussed in terms of their effect on intelligibility. Findings are evaluated in the light of previous research, and in terms of Flege's Speech Learning Model (1987, 1991, 1995). It is suggested that all segmental features of BSAE relate to two distinct levels: a functional (meaning) level and an aesthetic level. This study focussed on the functional level, and aimed to describe the segmental features of BSAE speech which affect meaning. Such a distinction has particular relevance for speech and language therapists who need to have a clear rationale for their work with BSAE-speaking clients. Clinical implications specific to this emerging client group within South Africa are discussed.

The aim of the study was to assess the emergent literacy knowledge of a group of South African pre-schoolers from low and low-middle class families and to explore their home supports for literacy. The sample comprised 24 subjects, aged between 5 years 9 months and 6 years 5 months. Sixteen of the subjects were from low-middle class families, while the remaining eight were from low-class families. The emergent literacy knowledge of the children was assessed using the Emergent Literacy Assessment Profile (ELAP), which was developed for the purpose of this study. The profile included subtests derived and modified from existing batteries developed elsewhere in the world for assessment of emergent literacy. The children's home supports for literacy were ascertained by means of personal interviews conducted with the parents in their home environments. Although both groups exhibited poor emergent literacy knowledge in general, it was found that there were statistically significant differences in the performance of the two groups on several subtests of the ELAP. The group of children from low-middle class families displayed relatively better literacy knowledge than their counterparts from low-class families. This group (i.e. the low-middle class group) also had better access to home supports for literacy. Thus, differences in home supports for literacy were strongly linked to differences in socio-economic status. The findings of the study confirm the much documented finding that home environments impact greatly on children's emergent literacy development. The finding that even the children with relatively more favourable home environments displayed deficits in emergent literacy knowledge indicates the urgent need to promote the emergent literacy development of pre-schoolers in South Africa, particularly those from historically disadvantaged communities. This has implications for parents, teachers, educare workers, librarians and speech-language therapists, inter alia.

The utilization of interpreters in medical interviews has increasingly become a focus of research, both globally and in South Africa. Effective communication lies at the core of the delivery of a patient-focussed approach to health care and this has been a factor in the drive to improve service delivery, especially from a communication perspective. A number of studies in health care have focussed on the medical interaction between health professionals and their patients. In this study, the aim was to describe and analyse interpreted diagnostic consultations, specifically focussing on the interactions between the health professional, trained interpreter and caregiver. The research was conducted at a tertiary level children's hospital in Cape Town. A qualitative research design was employed in this study. The participants were three health professionals [medical doctors], and a trained interpreter, all employed at a tertiary level children's hospital in the Western Cape, and three caregivers of the children attending the outpatients department. Video recordings of initial assessment consultations were made and thereafter each participant in the consultation, was interviewed. Detailed analysis of the consultations was done using the methods of conversational analysis. Thematic analysis of the post-consultation interviews was done and the findings triangulated with the themes emerging out of the conversational analysis. The findings resulting from the conversational analysis, suggest that interactions taking place in this study could be described as institutional interactions. This was suggested on the basis of the patterns of interactional behaviour, which emerged in the communications of the participants, the interactional strategies used and the interpreter models employed. The need for training for health professionals in interactional strategies also became apparent and highlighted aspects, which may be included in future training of health professionals, which may serve to advance the quality of communication in medical interactions.

This study investigated the principles of quality management and their application to a private speech-language therapy practice. The history of quality management and the development of quality management in industry and health care services were reviewed. Quality was defined in terms of the context of the author's private speech-language therapy practice and a working definition of quality was developed. The principles in the development of a quality management programme were described. These principles were used to develop and implement a quality management programme in the author's private speech-language therapy practice. Financial management and client satisfaction were selected as strategic quality factors in the initial stages of the quality management programme. Practice policies were revised to establish success criteria and to measure the practice's conformance to these criteria. The quality management programme enabled the author to improve the quality and effectiveness of her practice's financial management system and to demonstrate the client-centered orientation of the practice by implementing client satisfaction as a quality indicator.

The aim of the present study was to objectively address the effects of nasogastric.tubes on normal swallowing physiology. In addition, the differential effects of fine and wide-bore nasogastric tubes on swallowing function, were targeted for investigation. Only young, normal subjects were studied, to eliminate age-related swallowing changes (Robbins et al., 1992). The method of videofluoroscopy was used to determine the relationship between different size nasogastric tubes on the temporal parameters of normal oropharyngeal swallowing movements and bolus transit motion. Each subject served as their own control, allowing comparison of the individual's normal swallowing patterns with their swallowing in the presence of a nasogastric tube.

No description available.

<p> This study is a rhetorical analysis of 911 active shooter calls. Working from frame theory it examines the types of communication that occur during crisis situations. This study reviews the actual audio tapes of the Columbine Colorado School shooting, the Trolley Square Salt Lake City UT shooting and the Arizona shooting of Congresswoman Gabby Gifford. This study provides a method for investigating the communication between caller to 911 and the telecommunicators that answer 911calls. It provides a baseline of the communication activities that are occurring and this method of communication is rapidly changing with pending text-mediated communication scheduled to take effect in 911 centers in 2014.</p>