By William Elwood, Ph.D.

In the beginning was the word … and that has never ceased to be the case. Spoken or unspoken, words reign supreme, as humans are such only as they communicate. Symbolic behavior, such as geometric engravings, has long been indicative of modern cognition … of humanity.

In the realm of health, the supremacy of communication is paramount; and it is just as important in government, since “all policy is really about narrative,” as Dr. Paul Dolan, Professor of Behavioral Science at the London School of Economics would have it.

Surprisingly, communication and research in communication and language tend to be overlooked, perhaps due to language’s pervasive nature. However, we risk not paying sufficient attention to the foundation of health care and public health work when we do not give communication research its due.

The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) is not making that mistake. Instead, it is striving toward a better understanding of human communication. It recently released the first report on federal government’s research and development (R&D) activities that increase our collective understanding of human language and communication.

@whitehouseostp released report on federal gov R&D in human #language & #communication #commresearch

To create the report, OSTP’s Interagency Working Group on Language and Communication recruited representatives from various agencies, developed a taxonomy and questionnaire based on those agencies’ respective portfolios, surveyed all Federal agencies, and analyzed the data from all agencies that responded.

The topic Language and Communication Technologies was the most-reported subtopic across agencies, with more complementarity than overlap. For example, many departments and agencies report work on speech analysis and recognition, but for different purposes:

• The Department of Education uses speech recognition technology to develop intelligent tutoring systems that correct students’ pronunciation, similar to a human tutor.
• The Department of Defense develops and tests speech analysis and recognition tools so that military personnel correct their pronunciation and become more fluent in foreign languages.

NIH Supports Research in Symbolic Behavior to Improve Health

NIH and the Departments of Defense and Education conduct or fund the majority of research in Language and Communication Abilities and Skills. Part of NIH’s mission is to conduct research in the pursuit of knowledge about the nature of behavior. It’s no surprise that our portfolio includes research on sharing information in social settings on how to manage health, wellness, risk, and safety. For example, NIH-funded research has found that people who speak multiple languages beginning in childhood are more likely to learn, organize, plan, process, and remember information (executive function and neuroplasticity) throughout their lives.

How symbolic #behavior influences attitude, thoughts & #health affecting behavior? #commresearch

NIH funds translational and applied intervention research that strives to influence human thought and behavior to improve and maintain health and well-being, ensure adherence to treatments, and improve the prevision of health care services. Such interventions include strategically designed questionnaires that elicit personal information and behavior. Yet NIH’s cataloging system does not necessarily code such projects as language and communication, as the agency’s reporting system emphasizes labels relevant to healthier attitudes and behaviors over labels focusing on communication per se.

Proper cataloging of #language & #communication at #NIH aids #commresearch & #publichealth

For example, the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Disease’s (NIDDK) Diabetes Prevention Program (DPP) was a multicenter clinical research study that tested whether an intensive lifestyle intervention or treatment with the prescription drug metformin could prevent or delay the onset of type 2 diabetes in study participants. This program’s findings and successes rest heavily on strategic use of language, but that is often overlooked because of the focus on managing diabetes and reducing diabetes risk factors.

The medical results of the DPP were significant. The DPP found that participants in the intensive lifestyle intervention who lost a modest amount of weight sharply reduced their chances of developing diabetes. Taking metformin also reduced risk, though less dramatically. These results were so profound that the DPP’s external monitoring board halted the study early to share this intervention with a broader population!

Language & #communication play critical role in success #healthinterventions. #Commresearch matters

However, the effective use of language and communication underlay the study’s wild success. Reviewing the description of the lifestyle intervention, which relied on case managers delivering a core set of information, one can surmise that language and communication played a critical role in the success of this intervention. However, the NIH project terms that catalog these grants include:

behavior modification; behavioral/social science research; body physical activity; clinical trials; cost effectiveness; diabetes mellitus therapy; diabetes risk; diet therapy; disease/disorder prevention/control; exercise; glucose tolerance; health behavior; human subject; human therapy evaluation; hyperinsulinism; lifestyle; longitudinal human study; metformin; noninsulin dependent diabetes mellitus; nutrition related tag; obesity; patient oriented research; weight control.

These terms certainly apply, but they do not account for the interventions’ words and mediums which apparently motivated people to watch their diet and increase their physical activity.

Researchers: Submit posts on comms research. How symbolic #behavior impacts health and wellbeing? #commresearch

The OSTP found the work group’s report so promising that they asked the group to continue and expand its work. OBSSR director Dr. William Riley serves as co-chair of the OSTP Subcommittee on Social, Behavioral, and Economic Sciences of which this Interagency Working Group is a part.

This post begins a series that summarizes portions of this OSTP group’s work. This #commresearch series also will include NIH-funded researchers’ guest posts on this scientific field that explains how symbolic behavior influences attitude, thoughts, and corresponding behavior that impacts health and wellbeing.

References

Abbott, M, Brecht, RD, Davidson, DE, Fenstermacher, H, Fischer, D, Rivers, WP, Slater, R, Weinberg, A, & Wiley, T. (2014). Languages for all? Final report. The Language Enterprise.

Archila-Suerte, P, Zevin, J, & Hernandez, AE. (2015). The effect of age of acquisition, socioeducational status, and proficiency on the neural processing of second language speech sounds. Brain and Language, 141, 35-49.

Bradley, KA, King, KE, & Hernandez, AE. (2013). Language experience differentiates prefrontal and subcortical activation of the cognitive control network in novel word learning. Neuroimage, 67, 101-110.

Diabetes Prevention Program Research Group. (2002). Reduction in the incidence of type 2 diabetes with lifestyle intervention or metformin. New England Journal of Medicine, 346, 393-403.

Knowler, WC. Prevention of type 2 diabetes mellitus. NIH grant 1Z01DK060951. Retrieved 19 May 2015, http://projectreporter.nih.gov/project_info_description.cfm?aid=6984162&icde=24702388

Marian, V, Chabal, S, Bartolotti, J, Bradley, K, & Hernandez, AE. (2014). Differential recruitment of executive control regions during phonological competition in monolinguals and bilinguals. Brain and Language, 139, 108-117.

Rosenthal, DB, Wadsworth, LA, Russell, T, Matthew, J, Elfenbein, HA, & Sanchez-Burks, J. (2009). Training soldiers to decode nonverbal cues in cross-cultural interactions. ARI Research Note 2009-12. Washington, DC: U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences.

The Diabetes Prevention Program Research Group (1999). The Diabetes Prevention Program: Design and methods for a clinical trial in the prevention of type 2 diabetes. Diabetes Care, 22, 623–634.

Photo Credit: Ubackdrop/Qvasimodo art