Senior Research Fellow
1 August 2011–31 July 2012

Office: Pinni B 3092
Tel. +358 (0)40 190 9771
Email: tarja.aaltonen@uta.fi

http://www.uta.fi/~tarja.aaltonen/

 

Research interests

My research interests include themes like intersubjectivity, talk-in-interaction, narrative studies and experiences of chronic conditions like aphasia and allergies. I am especially interested in how intersubjectivity or the experience of belonging to a common, shared social reality is sustained and produced in face-to-face interaction situations in spite of linguistic difficulties, other health-related problems or impairments like hearing loss.

My current study is related to the research project “Communication with hearing aid. A comparative study of persons with acquired hearing loss within their interactions in private settings and with hearing health practitioners” funded by the Academy of Finland (2011–2014) and led by Docent Minna Laakso, the University of Helsinki. The aim of the current project is to understand the communicative problems associated with acquired hearing loss among adults. First, it aims to explicate the process in which people in need of medical technologies (such as hearing aids) either adopt them or drop them. The second target is to develop new methods for evaluating the real-life consequences of hearing loss. The third aim is to gain knowledge of possible coping strategies in communication that can be associated with positive self-evaluations following a period of hearing aid use.

The data I will analyse is collected by video-recorded encounters between people needing and/or using the hearing aid and rehabilitation professionals as well as family members and friends. Principal method for analysing the video-recorded data is conversation analysis. The research group of Finland is a part of an international network “Hearing aids communication” (http://www.hearing-aids-communication.org/).