Godber, J; (2006) An investigation into manipulations of format and predictability on the description of viewed sequences. Doctoral thesis , UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

A person's ability to convey events is an integral part of everyday communication. In the clinic, clients with aphasia are often asked to describe visually presented events to assess their event description abilities. Although there is a growing literature on the visual and cognitive factors that may facilitate event description for clients with aphasia, there has been very little research on whether dynamic depictions such as video, rather than static ones such as line drawing or photographs, would affect the quantity and quality of the descriptions. This study investigated the effect of visual format on the event descriptions of typical (non-aphasic) and atypical (aphasic) participants. Participants were shown four narrative sequences depicted in video clips and photos derived from the videos. The number and type of situations and the characters involved were matched across formats. Language output was analysed for quantity of output, syntactic complexity, and informational content. No advantage for video was found for either the controls or the people with aphasia. In fact, two of the people with aphasia showed some advantage for photographs. The study also considered whether varying the cognitive load by using event sequences of lower or higher predictability would affect the quantity or semantic accuracy of the descriptions. No advantage was found in using more predictable sequences indeed, two of the participants with aphasia produced better descriptions for the more unpredictable sequences.

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