Measures of discourse production are important for clinical assessment of functional communication of individuals with aphasia from diverse ethnic groups. Despite a higher risk for stroke and aphasia among African Americans as compared to Caucasians, little information is available on ethnically sensitive clinical assessment of discourse for African Americans, nor is there an assessment tool that can systematically examine discourse production for aphasia at a variety of severity levels. This study contributes to a long-range plan to develop a clinically viable and systematic means of assessing discourse production among individuals with aphasia at a variety of severity levels from ethnically diverse backgrounds, as well as a database of narratives produced by African American and Caucasian adults with aphasia. The short-range goal of this project is to collect pilot data on a broad range of narrative discourse tasks from African Americans and Caucasians with and without aphasia. The three specific aims of the study are to pilot a range of tasks and analyses for their viability in assessing: a) narrative production for a variety of aphasia severity levels; b) ethnic features in narratives of African Americans and Caucasians; and c) robustness or vulnerability of ethnic features in narratives of African Americans who have aphasia. Six groups will participate: African Americans and Caucasians with mild aphasia, African Americans and Caucasians with moderate to moderately severe aphasia, and neurologically normal African Americans and Caucasians. Subjects will be characterized with a detailed ethnographic questionnaire and will be presented with a range of narrative tasks (single-picture elicitations, picture-sequence elicitations, narrative retells, story completion, personal narratives, and narrative synopses). Analyses will include a multi-factor ranking of overall quality, characterizations of narrative structure and content, and examination of morpho-syntactic contributions to the narrative structure as they vary across ethnic and clinical group boundaries. Results could hold important implications for building clinical measures based on a broader and deeper understanding of the interactions between functional discourse, ethnicity, and aphasia. ? ?

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD)
Type
Small Research Grants (R03)
Project #
1R03DC005151-01A2
Application #
6587918
Study Section
Special Emphasis Panel (ZDC1-SRB-O (22))
Program Officer
Cooper, Judith
Project Start
2003-01-01
Project End
2005-12-31
Budget Start
2003-01-01
Budget End
2003-12-31
Support Year
1
Fiscal Year
2003
Total Cost
$67,500
Indirect Cost
Name
University of Texas-Dallas
Department
Psychology
Type
Other Domestic Higher Education
DUNS #
800188161
City
Richardson
State
TX
Country
United States
Zip Code
75080
Matteson, Samuel E; Olness, Gloria Streit; Caplow, Nancy J (2013) Toward a quantitative account of pitch distribution in spontaneous narrative: method and validation. J Acoust Soc Am 133:2953-71