Remarks on the medical and social models of research in deafness and language development

Abstract

Research on deaf children’s language development has a long and complex history. Work is motivated by seemingly incompatible models of what deafness means. On the one hand, the dominant medical model documents hearing loss and spoken language deficits. Research contributes to continuing improvements in spoken language outcomes following neo-natal screening and early cochlear implants. On the other hand, the smaller number of researchers looking at deafness and language development in the social model have championed the diversity of deaf children, their rights to learn signed languages and be educated in bilingual schools. This paper covers a selection of research studies on deafness and language development coming from both the medical and social models. The main objective of the paper is to offer some remarks concerning a set of standpoints taken by researchers which require more careful discussion in order to further the field. It concludes with a suggestion for how the two diverging models could converge more. The proposal is to focus attention on the factors which lead to high quality early communicative interactions rather than access to words or signs.