Date of Award

8-1-1976

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Communication Sciences & Disorders

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to determine if a systematic approach to the study of nonverbal movements through the use of videotape playback and instruction provides a useful procedure for teaching nonverbal patterns and actions to student clinicians.

Thirty female student clinicians who had completed between ten and 400 hours of clinical practice were divided into three groups and matched according to the number of practicum hours completed by each student.

Group I received a one-hour training session which involved viewing of their videotapes accompanied by verbal instructions to attend to specific, defined, nonverbal behaviors. Group II received a one-hour training session in which the videotapes were not viewed, but the usage of the six nonverbal behaviors was defined and discussed. Group III received no training session, no videotape viewing, and no instruction.

Each clinician was videotaped for ten minutes of her regularly scheduled therapy session. After the subject had participated in her particular training session and completed at least two, but not more than ten additional therapy hours, she was videotaped for another arbitrarily selected ten-minute period with the same client that participated in the first videotaping. These videotapes were then viewed by the experimenter and the six nonverbal behaviors which were selected for this study were counted. The mean number of occurrences of each of the six nonverbal behaviors was calculated for the three groups.

Pretest and posttest data were analyzed using jt-tests and analysis of covariance. Group I displayed significant increases from pretest to posttest in the nonverbal behaviors which served as social reinforcers and produced 'a significant decrease from pretest to posttest in the behavior of self-manipulation. Videotape playback viewing and instructions to attend to specific behaviors effected more change in the observed frequency of nonverbal behaviors than did instruction without videotape. There was a significant difference among the three groups on the nonverbal behaviors of eye contact and smile when controlling respectively on a pretest of the same behaviors. There was no significant difference among the three groups on the nonverbal behaviors of positive head nod, negative head nod, positive touch, and selfmanipulation when controlling respectively on a pretest of the same behaviors.

Share

COinS