Clarke, M., Bloch, S., & Wilkinson, R. (2013). Speaker transfer in children’s peer conversation: Completing communication-aid-mediated contributions. Augmentative and Alternative Communication, 29(1), 37–53. https://doi.org/10.3109/07434618.2013.767490
This study examined features of speaker transfer between a 11;7-year-old boy with CP using a voice-output communication aid (VOCA) and his peer without disabilities. The peer used questions and meta-interactional prompts during the interactions, which appeared to inconsistently support the peer’s ability to judge turn completion (i.e., when the syntactic form suggested potential completion). The communication partners’ provided anticipatory completions of VOCA-mediated turns during periods of delayed progressivity during VOCA-mediated turn construction, but they were ignored by the aided communicator. Nevertheless, they appeared to serve an interactional purpose by giving more status to subsequent VOCA-mediated elements which simultaneously projected backwards in clarifying the turn while also moving the interaction forward. VOCA-mediated delays in progressivity immediately following the communication partner’s turn were less likely to encounter further anticipatory completions than after the boy produced new elements or elements revealing the accuracy of anticipatory completion. The AAC user’s gaze was used to signal turn completion by looking from the VOCA to the partner, and it was used to prolong a turn by remaining fixed on the VOCA, despite the introduction of a plausible place of completion. At times a candidate completion was combined with gaze toward the AAC user, signaling a possible negotiation for early completion of the VOCA-mediated turn. At other times a candidate completion was combined with VOCA oriented gaze, signaling engagement in a “guess ahead” game of VOCA speech that served more of an interactional or social function.