Cultural Adaptation of the Functional External Memory Aid Tool for Use in the United Kingdom and Australia.
Anna K Saylor, Sarah Appleton, Catrin Rees and 5 others
PMID 39635579WHAT IT FOUND
UK and Australian versions of the FEMAT memory-aid test were adapted without changing task concepts.
Field testing found the materials acceptable, but equivalence with the US version has not yet been shown.
Key findings
01The UK and Australian adaptations did not change the meaning of the FEMAT tasks.
02Changes were mainly to culturally specific wording, addresses, dates, phone numbers, and audio recordings.
03Six UK clinicians or students and five Australian patients reviewed the tools, and the materials were found acceptable.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The paper reported no human-subjects data were collected, while field testing included six UK clinicians or students and five Australian patients. The adaptations used general national dialects rather than regional dialects, so they may not fit all cultures within the UK or Australia. The paper did not show that the UK and Australian versions are equivalent to the US version, and it says larger quantitative testing is needed. The FEMAT is not a norm-referenced or criterion-referenced assessment.
Declared interests
The authors reported no financial or non-financial conflicts of interest. The original FEMAT developer and research team co-led the adaptation and kept copies of the final UK and Australian versions.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume the UK or Australian FEMAT versions are validated or equivalent to the US version. The paper describes adaptation and small field testing, and it says further quantitative testing with a larger sample is needed.