The Impact of Inclusion Setting on the Academic Performance, Social Interaction and Self-Esteem of Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

This research investigates the impact of inclusion setting on academic performance, social interaction, and deaf and hard-of-hearing (D/HH) students’ self-esteem. As opposed to the traditional nature of conducting a literature review, meta-analysis has the advantage of offering a critical evaluation of several previous studies with a common theme and combining their results. This has the potential of increasing statistical power which improves the generalizability of findings to a wider population. Thus, this study provides important conclusions that are likely to influence future research and decisions made by policymakers regarding the impact of inclusion setting on academic performance, social interaction and self-esteem of D/HH students. Guidelines of PRISMA (2009) was adopted for searching relevant studies by using keywords. The websites of World Library World Cat, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, Biomed Central, Psyc INFO, Global Health, MEDLINE, EMBASE, PubMed, and Google Scholar were searched for relevant research conducted from January 1st, 1990 to February 28th, 2020. Therefore, the present study is a systematic review of the studies followed by a meta-analysis of proportions carried out using Med Calc online software. The results of the present findings have demonstrated that inclusion setting improves academic performance, social interaction, and self-esteem of D/HH students. Based on our findings, we recommend that D/HH children should have access to a ‘good inclusion setting’. Therefore, policymakers and practitioners ought to advocate the need for developing special strategies for such children.