When it’s “now or never”

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ignacio Satti
Keyword(s):  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
Proper Place

Abstract Individuals who share knowledge of past events may encounter different practical problems when engaging in the co-telling of those events. Drawing upon conversation analysis, this article investigates how co-tellers manage interpolated opportunities to initiate other-repair in collaborative storytelling. The analysis focuses on the placement of different repair operations on the story-in-progress and shows that co-tellers monitor the progressivity of the storytelling activity to identify proper places to initiate repair. Repairs that are initiated out of place can be oriented to as inappropriate and require more interactional work from participants. When tellers project the continuation of the story beyond a proper place, co-tellers display urgency for halting the story’s current trajectory, which shows their orientation to this moment as a last opportunity to initiate repair. This last possible point to repair the story-in-progress is what I call a “now or never” moment. Data stem from video-recorded collaboratively told stories in Spanish.

Counseling and new media technologies: A comparison of problem presentations in e-mail and in chat

2016 ◽  
Vol 12 (2-3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Wyke Stommel ◽  
Fleur Van der Houwen
Keyword(s):  
New Media ◽  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
Online Counseling ◽  
Counseling Program ◽  
Media Technologies ◽  
Email Counseling ◽  
Counseling Clients ◽  
E Mail ◽  
Shed Light ◽  
New Media Technologies

In this article, we examine problem presentations in e-mail and chat counseling. Previous studies of online counseling have found that the medium (e.g., chat, email) impacts the unfolding interaction. However, the implications for counseling are unclear. We focus on problem presentations and use conversation analysis to compare 15 chat and 22 e-mail interactions from the same counseling program. We find that in e-mail counseling, counselors open up the interactional space to discuss various issues, whereas in chat, counselors restrict problem presentations and give the client less space to elaborate. We also find that in e-mail counseling, clients use narratives to present their problem and orient to its seriousness and legitimacy, while in chat counseling, they construct problem presentations using a symptom or a diagnosis. Furthermore, in email counseling, clients close their problem presentations stating completeness, while in chat counseling, counselors treat clients’ problem presentations as incomplete. Our findings shed light on how the medium has implications for counseling.

Formulating another’s report of troubles in peer support

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Pudlinski
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
United States ◽  
Community Mental Health ◽  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
Peer Support ◽  
Mental Health System ◽  
The United States ◽  
Telephone Support ◽  
Healthcare Settings ◽  
Professional Perspective

This study stems from an interest in peer support talk, an underexplored area of research, and in how supportive actions such as formulated summaries function in comparison to more professional healthcare settings. Using conversation analysis, this study explores 35 instances of formulations within 65 calls to four different ‘warm lines’, a term for peer-to-peer telephone support within the community mental health system in the United States. Formulations can be characterized across two related axes: client versus professional perspective, and directive versus nondirective. The findings show that formulations within peer support were overwhelmingly nondirective, in terms of meeting institutional agendas to let callers talk. However, formulations ranged from client-oriented ones that highlight or repeat caller reports to those which transform caller reports through integrating past caller experiences or implicit caller emotions. These tactics are found to have similarities to how formulations function in professional healthcare settings.

Managing uncertainty in healthcare interpreter-mediated interaction

2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 150-164
Author(s):  
Claudio Baraldi ◽  
Laura Gavioli
Keyword(s):  
Systems Theory ◽  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Social Systems Theory ◽  
Intercultural Mediators ◽  
Or History

This paper analyses healthcare interactions involving doctors, migrant patients and ‘intercultural mediators’ who provide interpreting services. Our study is based on a collection of 300 interactions involving two language pairs, Arabic–Italian and English–Italian. The analytical framework includes conversation analysis combined with insights from social systems theory. We look at question-answer sequences, where (1) the doctors ask questions about patients’ problems or history, (2) the doctors’ questions are responded to and (3) the doctor closes the sequence, moving on to another question. We analyse the ways in which mediators help doctors design questions for patients and patients understand and eventually respond to the doctors’ design. While the doctor’s question design aims at obtaining details which are relevant for the patients’ care, it is argued that collecting such details involves complex interactional work. In particular, doctors need help in displaying their attention to their patients’ problems and in guiding patients’ responses into medically relevant directions. Likewise, patients need help in reacting appropriately. Mediators help manage communicative uncertainty both by showing the doctor’s interest in what the patient says, and by exploring and rendering the patient’s incomplete, extended and ambiguous answers to the doctor’s questions.

Patients’ practices for taking the initiative in decision-making in outpatient psychiatric consultations

2017 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 169-184 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shuya Kushida ◽  
Takeshi Hiramoto ◽  
Yuriko Yamakawa
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
Treatment Decision ◽  
Close Inspection ◽  
Important Resource ◽  
Treatment Decision Making ◽  
The Way

In spite of increasing advocacy for patients’ participation in psychiatric decision-making, there has been little research on how patients actually participate in decision-making in psychiatric consultations. This study explores how patients take the initiative in decision-making over treatment in outpatient psychiatric consultations in Japan. Using the methodology of conversation analysis, we analyze 85 video-recorded ongoing consultations and find that patients select between two practices for taking the initiative in decision-making: making explicit requests for a treatment and displaying interest in a treatment without explicitly requesting it. A close inspection of transcribed interaction reveals that patients make explicit requests under the circumstances where they believe the candidate treatment is appropriate for their condition, whereas they merely display interest in a treatment when they are not certain about its appropriateness. By fitting practices to take the initiative in decision-making with the way they describe their current condition, patients are optimally managing their desire for particular treatments and the validity of their initiative actions. In conclusion, we argue that the orderly use of the two practices is one important resource for patients’ participation in treatment decision-making.

Communicative practices in talking about death and dying in the context of Thai cancer care

2014 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 263-271
Author(s):  
Pairote Wilainuch
Keyword(s):  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
District Hospital ◽  
Death And Dying ◽  
Family Members ◽  
Religious Support ◽  
Communicative Practices ◽  
Health Centres ◽  
Third Person ◽  
Thai People ◽  
Depth Interviews

This article explores communicative practices surrounding how nurses, patients and family members engage when talking about death and dying, based on study conducted in a province in northern Thailand. Data were collected from three environments: a district hospital (nine cases), district public health centres (four cases), and in patients’ homes (27 cases). Fourteen nurses, 40 patients and 24 family members gave written consent for participation. Direct observation and in-depth interviews were used for supplementary data collection, and 40 counselling sessions were recorded on video. The raw data were analysed using Conversation Analysis. The study found that Thai counselling is asymmetrical. Nurses initiated the topic of death by referring to the death of a third person – a dead patient – with the use of clues and via list-construction. As most Thai people are oriented to Buddhism, religious support is selected for discussing this sensitive topic, and nurses also use Buddhism and list-construction to help their clients confront uncertain futures. However, Buddhism is not brought into discussion on its own, but combined with other techniques such as the use of euphemisms or concern and care for others.

Gaze behavior of pre-adolescent children afflicted with Asperger Syndrome

2013 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-186 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mari Wiklund
Keyword(s):  
Asperger Syndrome ◽  
Conversation Analysis ◽  
High Functioning Autism ◽  
Eye Contact ◽  
Nonverbal Behaviors ◽  
Gaze Behavior ◽  
High Functioning ◽  
The Gaze ◽  
In The Beginning ◽  
Straight Ahead

Asperger syndrome (AS) is a form of high-functioning autism characterized by qualitative impairment in social interaction. People afflicted with AS typically have abnormal nonverbal behaviors which are often manifested by avoiding eye contact. Gaze constitutes an important interactional resource, and an AS person’s tendency to avoid eye contact may affect the fluidity of conversations and cause misunderstandings. For this reason, it is important to know the precise ways in which this avoidance is done, and in what ways it affects the interaction. The objective of this article is to describe the gaze behavior of preadolescent AS children in institutional multiparty conversations. Methodologically, the study is based on conversation analysis and a multimodal study of interaction. The findings show that three main patterns are used for avoiding eye contact: 1) fixing one’s gaze straight ahead; 2) letting one’s gaze wander around; and 3) looking at one’s own hands when speaking. The informants of this study do not look at the interlocutors at all in the beginning or the middle of their turn. However, sometimes they turn to look at the interlocutors at the end of their turn. This proves that these children are able to use gaze as a source of feedback. When listening, looking at the speaker also seems to be easier for them than looking at the listeners when speaking.

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