**4. Discussion**

The central purpose of this study was to investigate the characteristics of the communicative interactions between children/youths with complex needs and their communication partners in the EGAT condition compared to the NEGAT condition. A systematic video coding was conducted to examine the interactional structure and communicative functions used by the dyads when EGAT is or is not used. The results demonstrated that when using EGAT, the children/youths initiated a conversation more frequently and tended to provide more information during the communicative interactions, while their communication partners made fewer communicative turns, initiated less frequently, and made fewer requests compared to the NEGAT condition. These findings, strengthened by a three-tiered method of analysis, indicated that when EGAT was provided, the children/youths could make a greater contribution to the communicative interaction compared to the NEGAT condition. This study supported that children as young as four could benefit from using this high technology to increase the power of communication during social interactions.
