Clinical Pragmatics

Part 1 Exploring communication: language and communication; intention in communication; unintentionality and coversational principles; interior and exterior communication. Part 2 Pragmatics, discourse analysis and clinical pragmatics: pragmatics; semiotics and pragmatics; discourse and discourse analysis; clinical pragmatics; relevance to speech pathology and therapy. Part 3 Analyzing discourse: speech acts; exchange structure; opening-middle-closing sequences; metacommunication; discourse analysis of clinical interaction; turn taking; cohesion; coherence; informativity; communication strategies. Part 4 Issues in clinical pragmatics: identification of communicative behaviours; appropriateness vs. inappropriateness; examples - contextual influences on children's repair and clarification; incohesion in discourse; interaction of linguistic levels. Part 5 Disturbance of pragmatic functioning: literature review; the pragmatic component of communicative competence; aspects of pragmatic "knowing that"; influences bearing upon the pragmatic component; pragmatic knowledge and severity of disturbance; semantic-pragmatic disorder?; pragmatic continuum; issue of diagnosis. Part 6 Pragmatic assessment: issues in sampling; issue in analysis and interpretation; frameworks for assessment; overview of pragmatic assessment protocols. Part 7 Issues in treatment: effectiveness and limitations of established methods; accountability; attitudes to disability; attitudes to the young and old; knowledge and belief concerning learning and behavioural change; impaired performance vs. disability; generalization; high-quality interactions; "Top-Down" vs. "Bottom-Up" approaches; principles for pragmatic-based therapy. Part 8 Clinical examples: Simon; John and David; chronological data; Peter. Part 9 Administrative considerations: current practice in USA and UK; the needs of clients; the needs of professionals; showing results; accountability; support for pragmatically based therapy; summary and recommendations.