Do Nurses Use Discourse Markers Differently when Using Their Second Language as Opposed to Their First while Interviewing Patients?

This study examined whether discourse-marker use changes in nurse-patient interactions as a function of nurses using their first (L1) or second (L2) language. Discourse markers were analyzed as turn-maintenance markers that indicate acknowledgement and discourse-shift markers that signal shifts of a topic or speaker in the conversation. These two categories differ in terms of degree of discourse management and interactional control. Sixteen nurses conducted a pain-assessment interview with a patient native speaker of English and with a patient native speaker of French, where the nurses used their own L1 in one case and their own weaker L2 in the other. The first hypothesis, that nurses would generally use discourse markers more frequently in the L1 than in the L2, was not supported. The second hypothesis, that nurses would use discourse-shift markers less frequently in their L2 compared to the L1, relative to their (baseline) use of turn-maintenance markers, was supported. The findings, especially the support for the second hypothesis, could have implications for the development of L2 training for health practitioners.</p

Communication accommodation between patients and health professionals: Themes and strategies in satisfying and unsatisfying encounters

This paper has several goals. One is to introduce and contextualize the papers that contribute to this special issue. All of the papers in the issue are grounded in Communication Accommodation Theory and Coupland, Wiemann & Giles'(1991) typology of miscommunication. These theories are briefly reviewed here, and some links between them are explored in the context of the contributory papers. Another goal of this paper is to discuss some of the themes and issues raised by a reading of the other papers as a set. In this regard, two issues which may be worthy of further research and theoretical attention in the future are selected and highlighted. First, the degree to which communicators are aware of various language and communication strategies, especially accommodation strategies, is considered. The relationship between awareness and research tasks such as self-reporting is important here. Second, the concept of accommodation dilemmas, their relationship to miscommunication and problematic talk, along with possible avenues of dilemma resolution are explored

Observance of international accounting standards Factors explaining non-compliance

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre-DSC:0570.7625(no 74) / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo