Alternative communication: theory and clinical practice

Abstract

Introduction: The communication board is a low-technology resource available for the implementation of an Alternative Communication system. Objective: To investigate, from the testimony of ten speech-language pathologists, the language conceptions that found the introduction and application of Alternative Communication in the language clinic in patients with cerebral palsy and their relatives. Methods: Individual semi-oriented interviews and analysis of data through two guiding points: a) the conceptions of language; b) the relation between those conceptions and the practice. Content analysis was used, whose method is based on deduction and whose objective is the inference. Results: Results indicate various ways of implementation of the resource in the mother-child pair, with mostly the inclusion of the family in practice, although not always with theoretical support. Some of the favorable factors of the incorporation of the Alternative Communication outside the therapeutic setting are language conceptions with a social interactionist approach along with psychoanalytic concepts such as those who connect parents functions and subjective and language development. Conclusions: social interactionist, behaviourist and cognitivist based speech-language pathologist practices were observed.