title: Embodiment in tests of cognitive functioning: A study of an interpreter-mediated dementia evaluation.
abstract: This study explores how manners of mediation, and the use of embodiment in interpreter-mediated conversation have an impact on tests of cognitive functioning in a dementia evaluation. By a detailed analysis of video recordings, we show how participants-an occupational therapist, an interpreter, and a patient-use embodied practices to make the tasks of a test of cognitive functioning intelligible, and how participants collaboratively put the instructions of the tasks into practice. We demonstrate that both instructions and instructed actions-and the whole procedure of accomplishing the tasks-are shaped co-operatively by embodied practices of all three participants involved in the test situation. Consequently, the accomplishment of the tasks should be viewed as the outcome of a collaborative achievement of instructed actions, rather than an individual product. The result of the study calls attention to issues concerning interpretations of, and the reliability of interpreter-mediated tests and their bearings for diagnostic procedures in dementia evaluations.
authors.affiliation: Center for Dementia Research, Linköping University, Sweden; Stockholm University, Sweden.
authors.forename: Ali Reza
authors.initials: AR
authors.lastname: Majlesi
authors.affiliation: Center for Dementia Research, Linköping University, Sweden.
authors.forename: Charlotta
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Plejert
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology; D003144:Communication Barriers; D018864:Cultural Diversity; D003704:Dementia / Q000175:diagnosis*; D054242:Emigrants and Immigrants / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D036301:Qualitative Research; D013548:Sweden; D014175:Translating; D014741:Video Recording
keywords: cognitive functioning; dementia evaluation; embodiment; ethnomethodological conversation analysis; interpreting