Everyday Listening Comprehension

SKILL: Listening

DIFFICULTY: 5/5

LEVELS: 4, based on length and complexity

BRIEF RATIONALE: This treatment targets auditory comprehension beyond single sentences.

In Everyday Listening Comprehension, you will learn strategies for understanding recorded audio. The stimuli include announcements, commercials, conversations, voicemails, news reports, podcasts, etc. You will listen to the recordings and answer 4 questions via typing or dictation. At the end of each trial, you will see the strategies used and reflect on their effectiveness. The treatment auto-adjusts in difficulty based on performance.

AUDIO CONTROLS: You can listen to the audio more than once without penalty.

• Go Back: Go back 5 seconds.
• Slower: Enable a slower speech rate.

HINTS: Available in the lower-left corner of the screen. Using the hints will mark the questions as incorrect (since they were not answered independently).

• Find: Cue the audio to the section that contains the answer.
• Multiple Choice: Choose the right answer from three choices.

FOR THE CLINICIAN:

Everyday Listening Comprehension is considered a mixed auditory treatment for aphasia, meaning it directly addresses comprehension while including other modalities for an enhanced approach. The patient can respond verbally or via the keyboard, allowing clinicians to target multiple language goals simultaneously.

Strategies are included as an indirect treatment approach for mild auditory comprehension deficits. The education screen includes picture icons, simple language, and bolded keywords to support understanding for patients with aphasia. Kersey et al. (2021) found that participants with aphasia benefited from adapted strategy instruction to a similar extent compared to participants without aphasia.

Strategies include:

• Slower: Slow the speaking rate to help process information.
• Pause: Pause the audio and monitor your understanding.
• Go Back: Request repetition for clarification.
• Replay: Listen again if needed.

According to Wallace and colleagues (2022), studies have shown positive behavioral change following direct and mixed auditory comprehension treatments. The goal of using Everyday Listening Comprehension is to generalize skills to untrained audio using learned strategies.

This treatment can also be used for people with cognitive impairments in attention and memory. Use the auditory stimulus and questions to challenge patients to attend to the information and recall what they've heard. Use attention or memory strategies along with listening strategies in therapy.

Selected References:

1. Kersey, J., Evans, W. S., Mullen, K., Askren, A., Cavanaugh, R., Wallace, S. E., Hula, W. D., Walsh Dickey, M., Terhorst, L., & Skidmore, E. (2021). Metacognitive strategy training is feasible for people with aphasia. OTJR: Occupational Therapy Journal of Research, 41(4), 309–318.

2. Wallace, S. E., Patterson, J., Purdy, M., Knollman-Porter, K., & Coppens, P. (2022). Auditory comprehension interventions for people with aphasia: A scoping review. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 31(5S), 2404–2420.