Changes in the communicative skills of young people as a result of a communication training.
Maria Lucia Graziano Magalhães Torres, André Luiz Lopes Sampaio, Hugo Cesar Pinto Marques Caracas
PMID 37672409WHAT IT FOUND
Young people who took a communication training showed higher scores after training for clarity of expression than a lecture group.
Within the training group, self and parent ratings also improved for feedback, and video ratings showed more adequate speech rate and eye contact.
Key findings
01After the intervention, the training group had a higher mean score than the lecture group in Section I, the ability to send a clear message, with means of 18.90 and 16.05.
02In the training group, self-assessment scores rose for sending clear messages (p = 0.001) and giving and receiving feedback (p = 0.010), and parent scores rose for the same skills (p = 0.001 and p = 0.048).
03After the intervention, video ratings differed between groups in speech velocity and eye contact: 18 of 20 training participants and 12 of 21 lecture participants were rated adequate for speech velocity, and 19 of 20 and 13 of 21 were rated toward the camera for eye contact.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The study was done only with students from a private, middle-class school, so it may not apply to young people from other settings. Nineteen of the 60 participants did not complete all stages, leaving 20 in the training group and 21 in the lecture group. No participant met the exclusion criteria for stuttering, autism, Asperger syndrome, mental disability, or impaired communication due to a clinical condition, so the results do not speak to those populations. The paper does not name a single primary outcome, so it is unclear which result should be considered the main test of the training. The questionnaire outcomes were self-report and parent report, and only the video evaluators were blinded by randomised paired videos. The paper reports only before and after the intervention, not longer-term follow-up.
Declared interests
The authors report no specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. No conflict-of-interest declaration appears in the supplied text.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that this training is proven for shy adolescents with communication disorders. The sample was 60 recruited, but only 20 training and 21 lecture participants completed, and no one met the exclusion criteria for stuttering, autism, Asperger syndrome, mental disability, or impaired communication due to a clinical condition.