Development and Validity of the Feedback/Advice Spoken Task (FAST) to Assess High-level Pragmatic Language in Persons with Traumatic Brain Injury

Providing feedback and advice is a common communication genre encountered within work, family, and social settings. Persons with TBI demonstrate characteristic difficulties with employing effective communication strategies to execute this common speech act. I propose to analyze existing raw data from the Feedback/Advice Spoken Task (FAST) using a sociolinguistic analysis procedure similar to an assessment I have previously developed, but distinctly different respecting the increased cognitive complexity of this speech act. Analysis of FAST will be unique my earlier assessment analyses by employing more sophisticated soiciolinguistic analysis to be mentored by Dr. Leanne Togher using a plan outline in this submission. This approach will result in two new, refined FAST protocols and a linguistic analysis procedure that is distinct from my earlier assessment approaches. I will demonstrate validity by administering the FAST to a group with TBI (N=20) and a healthy control group (N=20). I will demonstrate reliability of the two parallel versions of FAST with these same two groups balancing order of versions within groups. Findings will result in pilot data for a new assessment for identifying higher-level spoken language deficits that can potentially impact familial, workplace, and social relationships. This product will be the subject of future grant submissions.