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A Longitudinal Perspective on Turn Design: From Role-Plays to Workplace Patient Consultations

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Book cover Longitudinal Studies on the Organization of Social Interaction

Abstract

This longitudinal conversation analytic study tracks a pharmacy student’s development of interactional competence in patient counseling from classroom role-plays to workplace performance, with a focus on turn-design practices. I first examine the learner’s employment of turn-design practices to achieve key patient counseling tasks (drug identification, allergy inquiry, and advice giving) in role-plays over a semester. Then, I analyze how the practices developed in the role-plays were utilized or modified in actual consultations at the workplace one year later. In the context of the analysis, I discuss the challenge to strike a balance between striving for a large data set and maintaining similarities across cases for comparison in order to observe changes over time.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    An increase in interactional practices may not always correspond with higher success in achieving the target action. For example, Karrebaek (2010) showed that despite more competent employment of interactional practices for gaining participation in group activities, a child ’s attempts to join these activities were blocked by some group members.

  2. 2.

    Another possible explanation may be that Mai became more acquainted with the counseling tasks and regained the capacity to attend to the interactional details taught in the communication course. Even if that was the case, instances such as excerpt (2b) would still inform her right “in the midst of things” on the “shop floor” (Garfinkel 2002) of what might happen when she bypassed the drug identification action.

  3. 3.

    The patient’s recycling of her affirmative answer may also be due to the overlap in lines 14–15.

  4. 4.

    Although empathy with patients was emphasized in the training course, students were trained to use explicit phrases to express empathy (e.g., Rantucci 1997) rather than to use interactional practices such as those used to orient to certain matters as delicate.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Hawaii Pacific University, Honolulu, HI, USA

    Hanh thi Nguyen

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  1. Hanh thi Nguyen
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Centre for Applied Linguistics, University of Neuchâtel, Neuchâtel, Switzerland

    Simona Pekarek Doehler

  2. Department of Design and Communication, University of Southern Denmark, Kolding, Denmark

    Johannes Wagner

  3. Department of Social Sciences, University of Fribourg, Fribourg, Switzerland

    Esther González-Martínez

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thi Nguyen, H. (2018). A Longitudinal Perspective on Turn Design: From Role-Plays to Workplace Patient Consultations. In: Pekarek Doehler, S., Wagner, J., González-Martínez, E. (eds) Longitudinal Studies on the Organization of Social Interaction. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-57007-9_7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-57007-9_7

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London

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