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The purpose of this paper is to provide guidelines on how to develop a naming test for an under-researched language, through adaptation of an English test. An additional consideration is how to make an assessment suitable for bilinguals. While test development involves a number of phases, the focus in this research is on test construction. To illustrate the steps required for this, a Tongan adaptation of the Boston Naming Test (BNT) for Tongan-English bilinguals is discussed. In the adaptation, language structure and cultural appropriateness are considered in item selection. This version retains just 7 of the original BNT words and includes 15 words of particular importance in Tongan culture. As the items in the BNT are ordered according to naming difficulty, the authors also consider how to determine graded difficulty for Tongan words, in the absence of a Tongan corpus or established information on word frequency/difficulty. This issue is resolved by asking Tongan-English bilinguals (n = 20) to rate a list of 175 words for frequency and familiarity. From this set, 120 words were then selected and presented as a picture naming assessment to an additional group of bilinguals (n = 42). Their responses were analysed according to accuracy and speed. A final list of 70 words with pictures was ordered on the basis of these responses for the next step of testing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Australia is rapidly becoming home to an increasing number of Polynesians. While the Maori/Pacific Islander 'economic migrant' may appear fit and healthy, statistically the incidence of diabetes, hypertension and cardiovascular disease is extremely high. When this profile is coupled with family reunion migration of older relatives who are living longer, it represents an escalation of current and future outlay for Australian health services. Qualitative semi-structured interviews were conducted with 67 Polynesian migrants in regard to their perceptions of health and illness, and their experience of health services in Sydney and the Hunter region of New South Wales. Three key respondents, all Polynesian nurses practising in Australia, were also interviewed. The findings indicate a concentration of disadvantage concerning educational achievement, skill levels and health literacy that reinforce the process whereby social disadvantage impacts on health outcomes. This study also reveals a nexus of issues around cultural behaviours and poverty that contribute to the incidence of obesity-related illness and limit compliance with recommended preventative measures and treatments. This paper includes a discussion of the socio-political context of health delivery to Maori and Pacific Islander migrants and how the contraction of services under neoliberal 'belt tightening' undermines potential capacity to treat culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) populations effectively. As Australian scholarship has traditionally concentrated on Melanesia, there is very little research on Polynesians who are one of our burgeoning migrant groups. This study therefore makes a timely contribution to redressing the lack of literature on Polynesian health, cultural practices and socio-economic positioning in this country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]