Language development in hearing impaired children

Failure to adapt to the needs of a child with deafness can be detrimental to his or her mental development.

The auditory system, as with all other sensory modalities, requires normative input of sound stimulation, needs the normative input of sound stimulation to occur in order for the anatomical development of the deaf child to be in order for the anatomical-functional development of the auditory system to be carried out correctly. The auditory system is composed of three sets of structures.

It is therefore important to to prevent possible language development problems in hearing-impaired children, since this vital stage is a key stage in the development of the auditory system.This vital stage is key in the formation of cognitive processes that interact with the use of abstract concepts and words. In this article we will review several keys to keep in mind in this regard.

Language development in hearing-impaired children

In the presence of a significant hearing impairment during infancy, language ability may be affected in a highly variable way, language ability may be affected in a highly variable way, depending on the most impaired area. depending on the most impaired area, differentiating between vocabulary, grammar, articulation, fluency, comprehension, pronunciation, etc.

In addition to the type of impairment that the child presents, language development is also influenced by the nature and quality of the communicative environment that surrounds the child, which is why a greater linguistic ability seems to be achieved if the mother is hearing compared to the case in which both mother and child are deaf.

More specifically, with regard to how the linguistic development of the deaf child takes place it is observed that, during the first 9 months, these infants show a level of vocalization similar to that of non-deaf children. At this time, discrepancies begin to be observed in the quantity and quality of the infant's oral productions. This is because the infant does not receive sufficient environmental reinforcement to encourage verbalizations.

Broadly speaking, it can be said that the development of a deaf child compared to a non-deaf child follows the same phases in both cases, although in the deaf child it occurs more slowly. In the area of syntax, many difficulties are observed, to the extent that they do not reachThe content of the speech is so complex that they are not able to master complex structures even at the age of 18 (a milestone that occurs in hearing children at the age of 8). Thus, the content of the utterances are simpler, with less significant content in plurals, prepositions, conjunctions or pronouns, as well as alterations occur in sentence elements such as plurals, verb tenses or gender.

Pronunciation is intensely altered in relation to intonation, rhythm, timing, etc., in addition to other serious syntactic distortions. in relation to intonation, rhythm, timing, etc., in addition to other serious syntactic distortions. As for comprehension, the child must use visual cues to help him/her understand the stimulation received. They also use lip-facial reading and other complementary methods to help them differentiate between lip movements shared by different phonemes or phonemes that do not have visible lip movements.

Differences in morphosyntactic development.

Research that has attempted to study the differences that occur between the morphosyntactic development of a hearing child and that of a deaf child The latter shows both deviations and delays in learning grammar and morphosyntax, in particular.

In more detail, studies have found that sentence length is significantly lower in deaf 17-year-olds than in deaf 8-year-olds. compared to those constructed by 8-year-old hearing children. Related to this, it has been found that deaf children do not construct complex sentences, unlike hearing 11-year-olds, who are beginning to master this ability.

In addition, the sentence constructions of hearing-impaired children are not syntactically varied, and the use of complex sentences is less frequent in deaf children. and the use of adjectives, auxiliaries and conjunctions is observed to a lesser degree, as opposed to a greater use of nouns and verbs (which can be attributed more meaning, making it more accessible to evoke the concept they represent), articles, pronouns and prepositions are also scarce in non-hearing children. Thus, the greatest differences between one group and the other refer to the use of "function" words.

Another group of studies has found three main conclusions in the comparison between hearing and deaf children: for the latter, the application of structures including pronouns, verb conjugation and the formation of long sentences is much more complex. the application of pronoun structures, the conjugation of verbs and the formation of long sentences is much more complex for deaf children; deaf children do not achieve the same level of proficiency as deaf children.Deaf children do not reach full language development at 18 years of age, although the evolution of language learning is progressively positive for simple sentences (but not for complex sentences); the greatest number of errors is concentrated in the use of function words in the non-hearing group.

Finally, at the neurophysiological level, other studies aim to analyze the level of specialization in the left hemisphere through the activity recorded by evoked potentials after the presentation of specific word lists.

The result obtained shows a discrepancy in the brain area activated during this task between the hearing and the deaf: the left anterior brain areas were activated for function words, while the posterior parietal areas, both in the right and left hemispheres, were activated for words with semantic content. Thus, it can be concluded that morphosyntactic mastery ability depends on the modality in which the linguistic stimulation received occurs.

Orientations in the optimization of oral language learning

Silvestre (1998) has proposed a list of conditions that are considered optimal for oral language learning to occur. The following conditions are considered to be optimal for adequate oral language learning to occur.

1. Family involvement

A high frequency of exchanges between parents and children is recommended in order to enhance the stimulation received. to enhance the stimulation received by the latter, ensuring a greater level of progress.

2. Early educational care

In order to achieve the highest possible degree of development, attending to sensitive periods of myelination attending to the sensitive periods of myelination and neuronal and neuronal plasticity.

3. Correct adaptation of the hearing aid

Indispensable for a correct interaction between the child and the environment.

4. Early auditory re-education

Essential to compensate as far as possible the deficiencies presented in each specific case. in each specific case.

5. Acquisition of lip-facial reading

It becomes a requirement for the comprehension of the oral language received by the interlocutor present.

6. Communicative and cognitive development

Since there is a close relationship between organic and psychic development, action must be taken to prevent difficulties in the former (hearing impairment) from leading to damage in the latter (psychopathology or emotional or cognitive discomfort).

Bibliographical references:

• Marchesi, A. (1987). Cognitive and linguistic development of deaf children. Madrid: Alianza editorial.
• Peña , J. (1992). Manual de logopedia (3rd ed.). Barcelona: Masson.
• Puyuelo, M., RONDAL, J., WIIG, E. (2002) Evaluation of language. 1st reprint. Barcelona: Masson.
• Puyelo, M. (2004) "Manual del desarrollo de la sordera" Barcelona. Masson.
• Silvestre, N. (1998) Deafness, communication and learning. Barcelona. Masson.