Facilitating generalized requesting behavior in Broca's aphasia: an experimental analysis of a generalization training procedure.

The team worked with adults who have Broca's aphasia. These adults can understand speech but struggle to speak in full sentences.

They taught each person to ask for things using short phrases. Then they tested if the new requests carried over to new topics and new listeners.

The design was a multiple baseline across behaviors. They started training on one request, then added more after clear gains.

Generalization training boosted requesting across topics and people. The biggest jumps happened with familiar trainers.

Scores with familiar partners reached the level of adults without brain injury. Gains with strangers were smaller but still clear.

Macdonald et al. (1973) used the same design and also saw positive carry-over. They shaped factual answers in a psychotic adult and ran extra trials after discharge to keep the gains.

Wesp et al. (1981) review shows that stimulus generalization research has long warned: test with both familiar and unfamiliar cues. The 1989 data echo that warning.

Okouchi (2003) mapped classic asymmetric gradients with college students. The aphasia study turns that lab finding into a clinical tool: train richly, probe widely.

You can lift this package straight into adult neuro-rehab. Teach one clear request, then rotate partners and topics before the client masters every item. Probe with both loved ones and new staff to see true carry-over. If generalization lags, add more exemplars and keep reinforcement strong. The payoff is real-world talking that sticks.