Dialogical functions of metaphors in medical interactions

This paper proposes a method for analyzing the dialogical functions of metaphors in communicative interactions, and more specifically in the context of medical interviews. The dialogical goals proposed and pursued by the interlocutors are coded using a coding scheme that captures seven mutually exclusive categories of dialogical moves. The functions of the moves, including metaphors, can be identified and correlated with other variables relevant to the type of communication under analysis. The coding scheme is used to analyze a corpus of 39 interactions between healthcare providers and patients affected by Type 2 diabetes. The exploratory quantitative analysis, for the purpose of determining the different distributions of metaphor uses between patients and providers, is combined with qualitative analysis in which the thematic areas of the metaphors are considered. The findings show how patients and providers use metaphors for pursuing different dialogical goals and meeting distinct communicative needs.

Aphids harbouring different endosymbionts exhibit differences in cuticular hydrocarbon profiles that can be recognized by ant mutualists

Cuticular hydrocarbons (CHCs) have important communicative functions for ants, which use CHC profiles to recognize mutualistic aphid partners. Aphid endosymbionts can influence the quality of their hosts as ant mutualists, via effects on honeydew composition, and might also affect CHC profiles, suggesting that ants could potentially use CHC cues to discriminate among aphid lines harbouring different endosymbionts. We explored how several strains of Hamiltonella defensa and Regiella insecticola influence the CHC profiles of host aphids (Aphis fabae) and the ability of aphid-tending ants (Lasius niger) to distinguish the profiles of aphids hosting different endosymbionts. We found significant compositional differences between the CHCs of aphids with different infections. Some endosymbionts changed the proportions of odd-chain linear alkanes, while others changed primarily methyl-branched compounds, which may be particularly important for communication. Behavioural assays, in which we trained ants to associate CHC profiles of endosymbiont infected or uninfected aphids with food rewards, revealed that ants readily learned to distinguish differences in aphid CHC profiles associated with variation in endosymbiont strains. While previous work has documented endosymbiont effects on aphid interactions with antagonists, the current findings support the hypothesis that endosymbionts also alter traits that influence communicative interactions with ant mutualists.

Spontaneous Communicative Conventions through Virtual Bargaining

Human-like computing will require machines to communicate interactively with people, to take in human knowledge and preferences, to explain the machine’s actions, and to generally coordinate human and machine behaviour. But even the simplest communicative interactions raise deep theoretical challenges. Human and machine spontaneously have to “agree” on the mapping between possible signals and messages. Such mappings are extremely flexible and influenced by large numbers of contextual factors in real-world interactions. Typically, there are many candidate signal-message mappings. Successful communication requires that both parties agree on the same mapping. We outline experimental and theoretical work exploring an approach to these problems based on “virtual bargaining,” according to which each communicative party attempts to infer which mapping would be agreed were prior communication possible. This chapter explores how such problems are solved by humans, and suggests directions for building computational models of these processes.

A Framework for a Sociological Description of the Communicative Interaction in Adults Who Stutter

Purpose The author presents a descriptive sociological framework for the communicative interaction between an adult who stutters (AWS) and other communication partners. The author shows that the communicative interaction between an AWS and another interactant is a sociological object that can be evaluated by both parties in real-time, and is impacted by settings, participants, identity, stigmatization, and the type of talk. These elements are consistent with Hymes' SPEAKING model, which was developed to describe speech communication in a social context and can lay the foundation for the development of an ethnography of stuttering. The clinical applications and implications of a sociological framework are discussed and future directions for research are suggested. Method This work is a refinement and enhancement of Mancinelli (2018) and Mancinelli (2019) and the research associated with that work. This is a tutorial with a clinical focus designed to introduce the readership to a sociological perspective on communicative interactions in AWS. Conclusions Stuttering is an emergent phenomenon embedded within a social interaction, necessitating a deeper understanding of the processes at work during those interactions. A sociological framework can provide a more comprehensive description of the communicative interactions as well as the sociocommunicative lives of people who stutter. The information obtained can inform the formulation of realistic, functional goals based on the daily life of the client. Implications for the development of an ethnography of stuttering are discussed.

Alimentando el lenguaje en niños con implante coclear en tiempos del coronavirus

The main goal of this trial is to train parents as facilitators of communicative interactions in their natural environment with their children, users all of them of cochlear implants that promotes the development of verbal language, through a non-traditional pedagogical orientation such as hybrid tele-assistance, that is finely interacts with the education for health and family well-being. The methodological approach was exploratory, descriptive, through hybrid sessions with synchronous sessions of an hour and a half with the parents and video-recorded samples of their communicative interactions during spontaneous speech with children in their natural environment “at home”. As a result, with the parents are achieved, the reestablishment of the communicative circuit and a positive change in the “linguistic nutrition” in their practices of participatory intervention during the dialogues with their children. In the future, the intangible costs that must be assumed because of the unexpected arrival of a child with hearing loss are reduced. In parallel, a place is generated for the reflection of a solid pedagogical and investigative proposal that makes transdisciplinarity visible as the first responders in health with projection in family, social and school education.

Bedingungen lokaler Innovationen

Some cities manage to mobilise innovation potential and respond to challenges such as demographic change, immigration or economic restructuring, while others do not. This book addresses the question: What are the conditions for the development of local innovation? Rather than primarily searching for the conditions under which local innovation can develop among economic, social or institutional circumstances, it focuses on the communicative interactions through which actors develop a locally embedded understanding or knowledge of these conditions and the constraints and opportunities they present. With contributions by Max A. Kayser, Panos Koliastasis, Melina Lehning, Georgios Terizakis and Alexia Timotheou.