Scholary and Academic

Revision June 17, 2008

ICA Research and Academic Committee:

A mission statement and preliminary plans for future endeavors

The International Cluttering Association’s research/academic committee comprises of clinicians from the USA, the Russian Federation and the UK, all of whom have an extensive background in the investigation of cluttering.

The basic objectives of this branch of the site are:

1. to disseminate scientific information about all aspects of research related to cluttering;

2. to foster research partnerships between investigators, clinicians and consumers in the area of cluttering;

3. to develop guidelines for teaching students about cluttering at a tertiary level.

Committee members are currently working hard toward achieving these objectives.

The above objectives arose out of discussions originally raised at the First World Congress on Cluttering in 2007, Katarino, Bulgaria, when the ICA was formed. At this time the immediate needs identified were for:

• the necessity of arriving at an agreed definition of cluttering in order to pursue scientific, practical and political goals;

• the investigation of the nature of cluttering: its epidemiology for the determination of the age of appearance; acoustical, psychological, central nervous system and behavioral characteristics; risk factors of cluttering appearance;

• studies on differential diagnosis of cluttering and coexisting disorders;

• the improvement of cluttering evaluation;

• the systematization of cluttering treatment with the determination of primary and secondary goals of intervention;

• studies on professional and public awareness of cluttering.

In the future we plan to have a separate forum for researchers to continue to discuss and refine different aspects of cluttering with the help of the people who clutter.

The results of survey of the members of the committee of international representatives of the ICA made by Isabella K. Reichel, the Chair of the Committee of International Representatives, showed that only in 26% respondents said that training courses in their country included a specific course in cluttering (Germany – 3 to 30 lessons, Israel – 1.30-minute lecture in the B.A. program; Netherlands – all schools teach an elective course in cluttering; Norway – many programs teach cluttering courses, but the number of hours is constantly decreasing; Russian Federation – an elective 17-hour course). A future 53% responded that they discuss cluttering in their training programs or in their stuttering course (Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, India, Thailand, UK, USA). Three countries mentioned that some programs teach cluttering in a clinical setting (Germany, Norway, USA). 21% responded that no training programs discuss cluttering (Indonesia, Japan, Lithuania, Sudan).

We believe this survey provides a good starting point for future investigations on the content of training programs on cluttering for SLTs all over the world and for the elaboration of guidelines for teaching students about cluttering at University level.

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