2. Conversational Repair
If you say something to a listener that you
believe the listener has not understood, you
will revise or repair your message to increase
the chances of successful communication.¹
3. Conversational Repair
Gallagher (1977)
Repairs in Children in stages 1 and 2
During conversation, adult listener indicated lack
of understanding by saying “What?”
More than 75% of request for clarification were
followed by a revised utterance
Shatz and O’Reilly found that of those who tried,
only 38% were successful.¹
4. Conversational Repair
As the child’s language abilities becomes
more sophisticated, their approach to repair
changes.
Gallagher
Younger child is most likely to repair by
changing a speech sound
5. Conversational Repair
So if the child says…and is misunderstood
“More cookie” the child will repair with “More
Tookie!”
Child 25-26 months will delete a word
“That little doggie” – “That doggie” or “Little
doggie”
Child end stage 2 early 3 will change words
“she drink milk” – “she drink it”
6. Conversational Repair
It is important to note that a revision or
repair is not necessarily more accurate or
more correct.
Cookie –Tookie
7. Conversational Repair
(Aphasia)
Rhythmic patterns during conversational repairs in speakers with aphasia
Richard A. Dressler: Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green, KY, USA
Eugene H. Buder and Michael P. Cannito: The University of Memphis, TN,
USA
When one of the conversational partners has aphasia, the
ability to successfully resolve problems may be hindered.
During conversations, speakers with aphasia (SWA) may
experience problems due to comprehension deficits, semantic
errors, and/or a lack of accurate self-monitoring. The ability to
correct mistakes or make clarifications requires an awareness
of the error and the ability to communicate an effective
solution.²
8. Conversational Repair
(Aphasia)
Altering the rate of speech has been shown to enhance
the communicative effectiveness of SWA
(Laskey,Weidner, & Johnson, 1976; Salvatore & Davis,
1979). These studies have shown that a slower
speaking rate can improve the performance of SWA on
language comprehension tasks. The improvements are
observed for single words, sentences, and paragraph-
length material (Marshall, 2001). However the positive
effect of reduced speech rate has not been shown to
occur in discourse (Nicholas &Brookshire, 1986)²
10. Presuppositions
An assumption the speaker makes
concerning what the listener knows about the
subject of conversation.
During the single-word stage
11. Presuppositions
Example: If a child is preparing to push a toy
car, he may make the presupposition that the
listener knows that the object in his hand is a
car. He might comment on what the speaker
doesn’t know, which is that he is about to
make the car “GO!”
12. Presuppositions
The child’s presupposition skills are limited until
about the child’s third birthday (stage 4).
Specific skills emerge
anaphoric references
Use of pronouns that have already been named
Deixis
Certain words are interpreted differently, depending upon who
speaks them (here/there this/that)
Grammatical ellipsis
The deletion of information when it is believed speaker
understands
13. Conversational Repair and Presuppositions
References
²Dressler, Richard A.,Buder, Eugene H.,Cannito, Michael
P. (2009). Rhythmic patterns during conversational
repairsin speakers with aphasia.
¹Hulit, Lloyd M., Howard, Merle R., Fahey, Kathleen R.,
(2011) Born to Talk: An introduction to Speech and
Language Development. 150-151,212-214,200-201
