Visual perception and language levels of deaf children.

Abstract

Researchers interested in deaf education agree that poor language development is one of the prime factors responsible for delayed communication skills as well as later achievement problems (5, 6). Deaf children exhibit delays in psychomotor speed, laterality, and perceptual motor development, when compared with the norms for hearing children (6). Poor language and visual perceprual development have been directly related to the process of reading and difficulty in one or both has been linked to learning disabilities (1). This study assessed the magnitude of relation between deaf children's perceptual motor development and their language development. To accomplish this, GO children between the ages of 5 yr., 3 mo. and 8 yr., 6 mo., who were of at least average intelligence (IQ 80 or above) as measured by the WISC-R and Leiter International Performance Scale were compared on measures of perceptual motor skills and language development. All children were either deaf or hard of hearing (70 dB loss), with the hearing loss being either congenital or prelingual. Perceptual ages were taken from the Developmental Test of Visual Perception (3), while language developmental levels were represented by Mean Length of Sign as used in Bloom and Lahey's (2) Test of Language Development. All children were ranked separately on measures and a Spearman rho was computed (4).