The interactional use of eye-gaze in children with autism spectrum disorders

2014 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 233-259 ◽  
Author(s):  
Terhi Korkiakangas ◽  
John Rae
Keyword(s):  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
Quantitative Methods ◽  
Eye Gaze ◽  
Children With Autism ◽  
Autism Spectrum ◽  
Interactional Competence ◽  
Video Recordings ◽  
The Social ◽  
Spectrum Disorders ◽  
Social Use

The well-known impairments in the social use of eye-gaze by children with autism have been chiefly explored through experimental methods. The present study aims to contribute to the naturalistic analysis of social eye-gaze by applying Conversation Analysis to video recordings of three Finnish children with a diagnosis of autism, each interacting with familiar others in ordinary settings (total 6 hours). The analysis identifies two interactional environments where some children with autism show eye-gaze related competence with respect to gazing at their co-participants: these are when the child carries out an initiating action or a responsive action. We discuss how this qualitative analysis of interactional structure could be extended using quantitative methods and eye-tracking technology in order to develop a better understanding of the disorder. Keywords: Autism; eye-gaze; conversation analysis; social interaction; interactional competence

Interaction in Assessment-Oriented Role Play: A Conversation Analytic Approach

2015 ◽  
Vol 38 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jian Hu
Keyword(s):  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
Quantitative Methods ◽  
Role Play ◽  
Analytic Approach ◽  
Interactional Competence ◽  
Strategic Competence ◽  
Collaborative Task ◽  
Video Recordings ◽  
Chinese University ◽  
Pair Work

AbstractTo date, only a handful of studies have investigated the interlocutor effects on peer-peer test discourse, and they focus almost exclusively on the paired format in the Cambridge speaking tests, which is mostly a discussion type collaborative task. In the oral English test administered by a Chinese university under the present study, role-play is a major test type. This study chose for analysis three out of over 100 video recordings of test takers participating in roleplay- based interaction. The author adopted conversation analysis (CA) and Young’s (2000) constructivist, practice-oriented view of interaction and competence to assist the interpretation of speech exchange throughout the interaction. It is evident from the data that learners make use of various interactional resources and employ different strategies in the assessmentbased role play. It could be tentatively concluded from the conversation analysis of the paired interaction that the interaction framework together with the participants’ strategic competence in negotiating their own interactional resources, to a great extent, determines their joint performance of the collaborative task. The configuration of pairing in terms of proficiency is found to have an impact on joint interaction performance and strategic use. The implications of the current study include: interactional competence could be more readily accessed via role play than discussion type of pair work; qualitative conversation analysis of test takers’ actual practices can reveal what quantitative methods are unable to detect, and therefore is an indispensable complement.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document