Influences of different language media used in early childhood upon subsequent development of speech and language in hearing-impaired children

Abstract

Ninety-one pupils with severe hearing impairment, ranging from 70 dB to 120 dB, were selected for the present investigation. Among them, 78 children had been educated by an auditory-oral method, while the remaining 13 children were taught by the auditory -oral method combined with manual communication such as fingerspelling or cued speech. Language and speech were evaluated in terms of development of reading ability and syntactic performance, severity of voice disorders such as articulation disorders, abnormalities of pich or intonation, as well as speech discrimination of words and syllables. The results demonstrated that severity of voice disorders was markedly influenced by the specific language media which was used in early childhood, especially if hearing loss was under 100 dB. In addition, the suprasegmental aspect of speech uttered by children who had been educated by auditory-oral method combined with manual communication was much disturbed compared to that of the children educated by the auditory-oral method, although no difference was demonstrated in language development between the two groups. © 1988, The Japan Society of Logopedics and Phoniatrics. All rights reserved.