Toward a psychology of deafness?

Abstract

A large scale study comparing Yugoslavian and American adolescents with normal hearing and with early profound deafness suggests that a relative tendency to impulsivity is a notable characteristic of the deaf group. Despite the conclusiveness of the study overall, there was little intercorrelation among individual subjects on the several test measures employed. A stereotype should be avoided therefore, and the tests viewed as perhaps tapping different personality aspects or avenues of development for what clinically becomes a final common pathway. Comparable and comparative studies of deaf children of deaf parents and of children whose hearing parents have learned manual language early may define how much the tendency is based on qualities of parental discomfort with a deaf child, on the unavailability of language, or on the absence of sound alone.