FACILITATING GENERALIZEDREQUESTINGBEHAVIORIN BROCA'SAPHASIA:AN EXPERIMENTALANALYSISOFA GENERALIZATIONTRAININGPROCEDURE

Theeffects ofageneralization training procedure onrequesting by4subjects withchronic Broca's aphasia wereexamined using amultiple baseline design across behaviors andsubjects. Subjects were trained torequest information onthree topics sequentially. Generalization across topics andpersons wasassessed inweekly probe sessions consisting of5-min conversational interactions withtrainers andunfamiliar volunteers inanontreatment setting. Results revealed generalization effects were greatest whentrainers, asopposed tounfamiliar volunteers, served asconversational participants. Nevertheless, subjects' requests increased withall conversational participants toalevel comparable toanormal comparison group assessed under conditions identical totheexperimental probes. Social validation oftreatment effects using asubjective evaluation procedure revealed significant improvementontheparameters oftalkativeness, inquisitiveness, andconversational success. DESCRIPTORS: aphasia, generalization, social validity, language, speech acts