Assessment of the pragmatic components of verbal behavior has largely focused on the dyadic interaction between mother and child. The present study used direct observation procedures to analyze communicative intent and subsequent frequency of turntaking between adults with developmental disabilities and their residential staff. An analysis of turntaking patterns suggested that in group discourse, questioning-type speech may have set the occasion for a greater number of subsequent conversational turns, than did command or declarative-type speech. The implications of this finding are discussed in terms of residential staff training and recent literature concerning mother-child interaction.
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