A STUDY TO EXPLORE PRESENCE OF SOCIAL SKILLS AMONG HEARING IMPAIRED STUDENTS

Abstract

Present study attempted to explore presence of social skills among hearing impaired students taking education from government special education schools and to compare different level of social skills based on different demographic variables. It is a descriptive study in nature and survey method is used to collect the data. Population of study is hearing impaired children living in division Faisalabad and Lahore. Sample of N=200 hearing impaired students are selected through convenient sampling technique. Responses of social skills are taken from mothers as mothers have better knowledge of proficiencies of their hearing impaired children’s social skills. Children’s age group was 05-20 years. Age range of mothers was 25-55 years. Social skills checklist was used to as tool of the study for collection of data. It is a mixed method approach and statistical measures were made via frequency distribution, t-test and ANOVA. Results of current study clearly depicted that 82% hearing impaired students have low level of social skills and 18% hearing impaired students have best level of social skills. Current study also find out that there is significant difference in social skills of students on the basis of living area and children age and there is no significant difference in presence of social skills in hearing impaired students based on mother’s working status (house wife and job holders) and mothers education level. Study also demonstrated that there was positive correlation among presence of social skills in hearing impaired students and their age. The study concluded that teachers should focus on individual differences while teaching social skills to hearing impaired children and should adopt different teaching methods and teaching strategies for every student. It was also recommended that job holder mothers should manage their time table and must spare their proper time for their special children to make them beneficial and socially adjusted child of community.