This study suggests that the concept of proto-conversation may be used to describe and understand communication with people with late-stage dementia who have lost their abilities to produce verbal language. In the study, a multimodal conversation analytic method is used to analyze sequences of interactions between professional caregivers in an elderly care home and people with late-stage dementia. The study shows how minimal actions (shift of gaze directions, vocalizations or bodily movements) not instantly recognizable as intentional, communicative conduct, may be recognized and treated as communicative contributions by engaging the person living with dementia in proto-conversations. In such interactional sequences, the caregivers do not only turn the contributions of persons with dementia into actions through their responses, but they also treat the persons as agentive actors and position them as partners in interaction.

中文翻译：

---

“原始对话”作为晚期痴呆症护理的一种实践

这项研究表明，原始对话的概念可用于描述和理解与失去言语能力的晚期痴呆症患者的交流。在这项研究中，采用多模态对话分析方法来分析养老院专业护理人员与晚期痴呆症患者之间的互动序列。该研究表明，通过让痴呆症患者参与原始对话，无法立即识别为有意的交流行为的最小行为（目光方向的转变、发声或身体动作）如何被识别并视为交流贡献。在这样的互动序列中，护理人员不仅通过痴呆症患者的反应将他们的贡献转化为行动，而且还将患者视为行动者，并将他们定位为互动中的伙伴。