A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of - Queen Margaret University

emember the route taking them from the bottom arrow to the top arrow while
avoiding the prohibited black lines. They rehearsed this task five times in
succession. Participants were given a fresh copy of the ‘stepping-stone’ route
with the prohibited routes removed. Each participant was then required to
complete the route that they had learned. After a break of three minutes (filled
with general conversation) participants performed this task once more as a
delayed recall task. They had not been advised that they would be required to
complete a delayed recall assessment. Each correct move was scored one point
and all incorrect moves were allocated zero. There were a possible maximum of
nine accurate moves for each completed route. The immediate recall and
delayed recall scores were combined to produce a total possible score of 18.
4.2.3 Screening of language abilities
A language screening test using single words was compiled by the researcher
and administered to each participant (see Appendix 4.5). The items included
extracts from published assessments such as the PALPA (Kay et al, 1992) and
picture stimuli from the literature (Snodgrass and Vanderwart, 1980). The
assessment included:
- Repetition of eight words and eight non-words (PALPA, Kay et al,
1992).
- Auditory lexical decision of the above 16 words. This involved
participants hearing words and non-words and indicating if they were
real words or non-words.
- Naming of 12 items from Snodgrass and Vanderwart (1980). These
items were selected on the basis that they had high naming
agreement (98-100%) and high image agreement (greater than 4). Six
of these words had high familiarity rating and six words had low
familiarity rating.
- Reading of eight words and eight non-words (same words as used in
repetition task above).
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