The value of audio description for the therapy of speech-communicative disorders

The article aims at presenting the potential of audio description (AD) as an efficient tool to support the speech-language and social-communicative skills of children with developmental disorders. It includes information for both speech therapists and parents on what they may expect from AD, and how they can use it in their everyday work with children. It may also serve as a set of guidelines for AD creators for making their products more effective. The considerations assembled in the article are based on a literature review. Remarks on the possible uses of AD are presented in the context of various problems to be remedied during speech therapy of a child; they range from incorrect articulation of sounds, through hearing problems such as auditory processing disorder, to developmental disabilities, such as autism spectrum disorder (ASD) characterized by difficulties with social interaction and repetitive behaviors including pretending play. The existing evidence proves that audiovisual (AV) materials are an attractive starting point for exercises with a child. Video-modeling, in turn, has proven to be one of the best tools for therapy of individuals with ASD, allowing for better understanding of interpersonal interactions. Therefore, AV materials accompanied with an AD track – which itself is perceived as a tool for enhancing information processing by children – need to demonstrate similar value for mastering communicative competences. AD can be an effective tool in speech therapy. However, to meet the needs of practitioners, caregivers and beneficiaries in a useful manner, it must be prepared with care regarding both its content and form.

Social Interaction: Communicative Approach

The article focuses on the study of requirements for communication in the social sphere and justification of their specificity in comparison with other types of verbal interaction. The relevance of the stated problem is determined by the significant influence of social communications on society and the dependence of public safety on the effectiveness of social interaction. The study aimed at identifying the types of violations of commonly known maxims in the social sphere and substantiating the specificity of requirements for social communicative interaction. Two main methods were used in the research: projecting and modeling. The well-known communication maxims were divided into two groups. The first group contains those that define the requirements for organizing the content of the message and are aimed at ensuring the fullness of its perception by the addressees. The second group includes maxims, which establish requirements for the moral climate of communication and the implementation of the principle of politeness. The data of interviews given by representatives of governmental bodies to journalists of certain TV channels and blogs, as well as the analysis of Internet news videos revealed the types of violations of the well-known maxims of communication in the social domain. The main ones are: ignoring the maxims of the second group in interviews and non-compliance with the maxims of the first group in news programs. It has been proved that the well-known maxims of communication need to be revised taking into account the conditions of social contact discourse. The specificity of maxims in social communicative interaction was substantiated.

Social Communication and pragmatic skills of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Developmental Language Disorder

ABSTRACT Purpose to assess the pragmatic and social communicative abilities of children with Typical Language Development (TLD), Autism Spectrum disorder (ASD) and Developmental Language Disorder (DLD). Methods Participants were 40 parents and 29 teachers of 40 children ages between 3 and 6 years. Ten children had DLD, ten had ASD and 20 had typical development. All participants answered to the questionnaire of the “Assessment of Pragmatic Language and Social Communication – APLSC – parent and professional reports – beta research version. Data were submitted to statistical analysis. Results The assessment tool was useful in identifying the difference in performance of children with different social communicative profiles. Conclusion Children with ASD presented social and pragmatic impairments that were more significant than those presented by children with DLD. However, both children with ASD and with DLD presented more social pragmatic difficulties than children with TLD.

Empirical Research of a Creatively Oriented Personality’s Formation of a Child of Senior Preschool Age

The purpose is a theoretical substantiation and empirical research of creatively oriented personality’s formation of a child of senior preschool age. Five components of the structure of a creatively oriented personality are outlined: emotional-volitional, intellectual-creative, motivational, social-communicative and operational. It is noted that the respondents have the highest research and exploration activity. High and medium levels of cognitive interest were recorded in n = 71 (59.1%). It is established that a significant part of children do not properly form the experience of creative activity. The profile of creatively directed personality’s formation of senior preschool age’s child on key psychological semantic parameters of the researched components which relevantly reflected a subject of research is built. It is established that the most significant correlations are observed for such indicators as creative potential, creative thinking, emotional potential (P ≤ .05; P ≤ .01) and (C ≤ .05; C ≤ .01). A significant part of children do not have a properly formed experience of creative activity. These children have difficulties in solving new, atypical, non-standard situations, which are characteristic of creative activity, which negatively affects the formation of creative personality. It is generalized that the received results of research it is expedient to operationalize in educational and professional preparation of applicants of pedagogical specialties.

Foreign Language Teaching in a Preschool Educational Institution as a Condition of Children’s Social Communicative Development: Specific Features and Methods

The article dwells upon specific features and peculiar methods of teaching a foreign language to preschoolers which will contribute to their social communicative development. The authors emphasize a stage character of this process distinguishing the initial phonetic stage, the second lexical stage and the final evaluative and reflective stage. The enhancement of phonetic, lexical and speech skills stipulates such forms of classwork arrangements as individual, paired and choral, each with its advantages and functions. For this age group, an analytico-imitative method has been recognized as the most effective one: cognitive imitation and reproduction are the basic forms of learning. In this respect, the content of the material intended for cognitive imitation has to be valuable, informative and thought-provoking. Special genres have to be found and applied to motivate children to learn and take part in activities: songs, counting rhymes, poems, fairy-tales and games. Children should be constantly involved into the emotionally appealing canvas of the lesson. The results of the research show that emotional impact, exciting forms of presentation and the informative content of the material increase preschoolers’ self-consciousness about their progress, create positive motivation and push forward their cognitive, communicative and social development.

Preference for biological motion is reduced in ASD: implications for clinical trials and the search for biomarkers

Background The neurocognitive mechanisms underlying autism spectrum disorder (ASD) remain unclear. Progress has been largely hampered by small sample sizes, variable age ranges and resulting inconsistent findings. There is a pressing need for large definitive studies to delineate the nature and extent of key case/control differences to direct research towards fruitful areas for future investigation. Here we focus on perception of biological motion, a promising index of social brain function which may be altered in ASD. In a large sample ranging from childhood to adulthood, we assess whether biological motion preference differs in ASD compared to neurotypical participants (NT), how differences are modulated by age and sex and whether they are associated with dimensional variation in concurrent or later symptomatology. Methods Eye-tracking data were collected from 486 6-to-30-year-old autistic (N = 282) and non-autistic control (N = 204) participants whilst they viewed 28 trials pairing biological (BM) and control (non-biological, CTRL) motion. Preference for the biological motion stimulus was calculated as (1) proportion looking time difference (BM-CTRL) and (2) peak look duration difference (BM-CTRL). Results The ASD group showed a present but weaker preference for biological motion than the NT group. The nature of the control stimulus modulated preference for biological motion in both groups. Biological motion preference did not vary with age, gender, or concurrent or prospective social communicative skill within the ASD group, although a lack of clear preference for either stimulus was associated with higher social-communicative symptoms at baseline. Limitations The paired visual preference we used may underestimate preference for a stimulus in younger and lower IQ individuals. Our ASD group had a lower average IQ by approximately seven points. 18% of our sample was not analysed for various technical and behavioural reasons. Conclusions Biological motion preference elicits small-to-medium-sized case–control effects, but individual differences do not strongly relate to core social autism associated symptomatology. We interpret this as an autistic difference (as opposed to a deficit) likely manifest in social brain regions. The extent to which this is an innate difference present from birth and central to the autistic phenotype, or the consequence of a life lived with ASD, is unclear.

PERSONAL AGENCY OF MODERN ADOLESCENTS: RESEARCH RESULTS

The article presents the results of a study carried out by a team of specialists for two years. It is devoted to the study of the role of the socially enriched environment of additional education in the development of personal agency of generation Z adolescents. Various theoretical approaches to understanding the phenomenon of are analyzed, and the author's view of its structure is presented. Personal agency is considered as an integrated personality characteristic, which manifests itself in the personality's ability to self-organization and selfrealization, to build a system of effective social interactions and moral and value relationships with people around and aimed at realizing the activity-related need for self-development and world-creation. It singles out such components as social-individual, social-communicative, social-interactive, social-moral. To diagnose the level of development of these components of personal agency, a complex of psychodiagnostics techniques is proposed. In the course of the experiments, it was shown that, in comparison with adolescents who are not included in the activities of the additional education system, adolescents participating in it demonstrate a greater focus on socially oriented activities, they have a better idea of their future profession, the ability to take responsibility for their actions. They work more effectively with information obtained from Internet resources, demonstrate a higher level of self-government in communication, and are more active in interacting with others. Altruistic attitudes are more common among them; in the hierarchy of life values, independence is given a high value.

#Foodporn: Fetishized sharing of food and its images

Once translated into images, food acquires a broader meaning. Food is no longer merely something to eat, but to show, share and look at. The increasing amount of images and pictures of dishes on our social networks, associated with hashtags such as #foodporn, expresses this renewed social, communicative and provocative function of food. However, the exhibition of these images is quite ambivalent when it comes to establishing determined patterns of visual and social relationships with and between users. The aim of this article is to analyze and attempt to provide mediation to this ambivalence. The pornographic exposition of food images no longer presupposes a transitive form of consumption by the user, but becomes pure and self-reflexing spectacle. The images are obscene (Baudrillard [1981] 1994) and characterized by an excess of transparency on their object which abolishes any form of seduction (Baudrillard [1979] 1990). Barthes ([1980] 1981) defines this kind of image as unary. Pornographic images are an emblematic example. In terms of their self-evident objectivity, these pictures lack any punctum, any piercing sign of a relationship with or openness to the observer (see Eco 1962; 1979). Nevertheless, behind their apparent transparency, the images are always products of specific perspective cuts, and still able to convey mystery, meaning and involvement. The unary image of food is a further fragment in a series of multiple perspectives on the same object. Such potentiality is actualized in our (social) media culture in which sharing and continuous remediation of images and pictures of food constitute a complex storytelling of the object. This, in turn, fosters further participation by the users. The ambivalence between the indifference of the pornographic image and the involvement in the serialization of the detail is synthetized by the notion of fetishism (Baudrillard [1972] 2019). The social (and) media scenery seems to exemplify and radicalize a sort of commodity fetishism, in which social relationships between users are shaped and mediated by (social) media relationships between images of food.

The development of animal models for autism: A gene-environment approach

<p>Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a pervasive neurodevelopmental disorder characterised by social, communicative, and behavioural deficits. Despite decades of research in this field, effective pharmacological treatments for ASD are still lacking and better animal models for this disorder are urgently needed. Although it is now well understood that both genetic and environmental influences play a role in the aetiology of ASD, most existing animal models for this disorder only take into account one of these aetiological contributors and have largely ignored investigating an interaction. The main aim of this thesis was to develop a novel animal model for ASD that demonstrated higher construct validity than traditional models by using a gene-environment approach. To this aim, two previously established environmental risk factor-based models for ASD were each combined with a genetic rat model that mimicked a genotype associated with ASD. Specifically, a maternal immune activation model (modelled via prenatal administration of lipopolysaccharide) and a prenatal exposure to valproate model (modelled via prenatal administration of valproate) were both combined with a serotonin transporter (SERT) knockout rat model. Next, experimental rats were investigated in a variety of paradigms designed to detect behavioural, biochemical, and immunological outcomes related to ASD. This thesis tested the hypothesis that rats with a genetically compromised SERT function would be more vulnerable to the impacts of the two environmental risk factors. Collectively, the data from this thesis show that rats with a genetically compromised SERT function are not more vulnerable to the impacts of a maternal immune activation or prenatal exposure to VPA. In fact, at least with regards to prenatal exposure to valproate, rats with a compromised SERT function actually appeared more resilient to ASD-like outcomes.</p>

The development of animal models for autism: A gene-environment approach

<p>Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a pervasive neurodevelopmental disorder characterised by social, communicative, and behavioural deficits. Despite decades of research in this field, effective pharmacological treatments for ASD are still lacking and better animal models for this disorder are urgently needed. Although it is now well understood that both genetic and environmental influences play a role in the aetiology of ASD, most existing animal models for this disorder only take into account one of these aetiological contributors and have largely ignored investigating an interaction. The main aim of this thesis was to develop a novel animal model for ASD that demonstrated higher construct validity than traditional models by using a gene-environment approach. To this aim, two previously established environmental risk factor-based models for ASD were each combined with a genetic rat model that mimicked a genotype associated with ASD. Specifically, a maternal immune activation model (modelled via prenatal administration of lipopolysaccharide) and a prenatal exposure to valproate model (modelled via prenatal administration of valproate) were both combined with a serotonin transporter (SERT) knockout rat model. Next, experimental rats were investigated in a variety of paradigms designed to detect behavioural, biochemical, and immunological outcomes related to ASD. This thesis tested the hypothesis that rats with a genetically compromised SERT function would be more vulnerable to the impacts of the two environmental risk factors. Collectively, the data from this thesis show that rats with a genetically compromised SERT function are not more vulnerable to the impacts of a maternal immune activation or prenatal exposure to VPA. In fact, at least with regards to prenatal exposure to valproate, rats with a compromised SERT function actually appeared more resilient to ASD-like outcomes.</p>