Development of main concept and core lexicon checklists for the original and modern Cookie Theft stimuli

ABSTRACT

Purpose

To improve the utility of the cookie theft stimuli by reporting normative control data on both original and modern cookie theft pictures for clinically feasible discourse analysis measures.

Method

Forty-five transcripts of original cookie theft descriptions by healthy controls were retrieved from the AphasiaBank database and 50 transcripts of modern cookie theft descriptions were contributed by Berube and colleagues. Following the procedure used by Richardson & Dalton (2016), checklists of main concepts produced by at least 33% of participants in each task were identified. Similarly, the Dalton & Richardson (2016) procedure was used to create core lexicon lists, defined as any lemma that was produced by 50% or more of the sample. Descriptive statistics are reported to support the appropriateness of the samples for use as normative data.

Results

Nine and 14 main concepts were identified for the original and modern cookie theft stimuli, respectively. Six main concepts appeared in both checklists, with unique concepts for each stimulus as well. The average main concept composite score for the original cookie theft was 17.4 (SD = 3.8) with scores ranging from 10/27 to 26/27. For modern cookie theft the average main concept composite score was 28 (SD = 7.6) with scores ranging from 12/42 to 40/42. Twenty-six and 42 lemmas exceeded the 50% cut-off and were identified for the original cookie theft and the modern cookie theft stimuli, respectively. Nineteen core lexicon items were shared across both lists and there were also unique items for each. Twelve function words and 14 content words were identified for the original cookie theft stimulus and participants produced on average 9 (SD = 1.7) function and 11 (SD = 1.8) content words. Twenty function words and 22 content words were identified for the modern cookie theft picture and participants produced on average 15 (SD = 3.3) function and 16 (SD = 3.1) content words.

Conclusions

The modern cookie theft stimulus elicited more main concepts and core lexicon items compared to the original cookie theft stimulus, which can be attributed to the instructions used with the modern stimulus and the new characters and actions. MCA and Corlex analyses are sensitive functional measures that can be clinically utilized to assess communication ability across clinical populations.

KEYWORDS:

• Core lexicon
• main concept analysis
• monologic discourse
• DementiaBank

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/02687038.2024.2340794.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Dr. Argye Hillis for sharing the modern cookie theft transcripts used in this project. The authors would also like to thank students Valerie Lynch, Hannah Sutherland, and Kristen Apple for their hard work in developing the checklists and scoring the normative samples.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).