Clarke, M., & Wilkinson, R. (2008). Interaction between children with cerebral palsy and their peers 2: Understanding initiated VOCA-mediated turns. AAC: Augmentative and Alternative Communication, 24(1), 3–15. https://doi.org/10.1080/07434610701390400
This study documented examined initiated voice-output communication aid (VOCA)-mediated turns of two children aged 7;11 and 14;10 years with cerebral palsy in interactions with their peers. Initiated VOCA-mediated turns frequently resulted in interactional problems. Naturally speaking peers appeared to exploit the resources of sequential context of the prior turn for understanding the meaning of initiated VOCA-mediated turns. Therefore, challenges in understanding occurred when the initiated VOCA-mediated turn did not relate to the speaking child’s prior turn. The authors proposed that communication partner challenges in understanding initiated VOCA-mediated turns may explain the motivation behind conversational asymmetries reported in the literature; the frequent use of questions and meta-interactional prompts by speaking partners may be used to create conversational slots for aided speakers that optimally facilitate the use of sequential context for understanding VOCA-mediated utterances.