Deafness, vocabulary knowledge, and the emergence of reading efficiency: Evidence from eye-tracking

About This Grant

Project Summary/Abstract Despite historical reports of lower reading outcomes of deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) high school students, evidence from eye-tracking suggests that skilled DHH adults who learned a signed language before learning to read are uniquely efficient: They read faster and rereading less than matched hearing readers without a negative impact on comprehension. What factors lead this subset of DHH children to become highly skilled adult readers? For hearing mono- and bilingual readers, vocabulary knowledge of the target language strongly correlates with reading ability. However, while studies have pointed to the emergence of reading efficiency in young DHH readers, the role of first- (L1) and second-language (L2) vocabulary knowledge has yet to be established empirically. We use eye-tracking and behavioral language testing to assess the degree to which L1 American Sign Language (ASL) vocabulary knowledge transfers to L2 English reading comprehension and supports eye- movement control during reading. L1 ASL vocabulary knowledge may be particularly important for this group of developing bilinguals for several reasons. First, they do not have typical access to the speech sounds of the language they are learning to read. Thus, their path to successful literacy may lie in the connection between visual form in text and word meaning in ASL. Second, they only read in their L2 as ASL has no written form. As such, while hearing L2 readers are typically less efficient than L1 readers, the exclusive experience processing text in English, compounded by visual linguistic processing expertise from extracting language information from visual forms in their L1, may result in highly efficient reading behaviors for DHH signers. To achieve our goal, we will predict DHH readers’ comprehension on a standardized measure of reading by L1 and L2 vocabulary skill as well as nonverbal IQ, working memory, print spelling recognition, and fingerspelling recognition (Aim 1). We will also use eye-tracking to assess the role of L1 ASL vocabulary knowledge while controlling for L2 English vocabulary knowledge as well as (finger)spelling ability, nonverbal IQ, and working memory on measures of eye- movement control during reading (L2). We further assess the emergence of adultlike reading efficiency, particularly regarding the information in text to which they attend (Aim 3). This project will provide insight into the successful path to literacy for DHH students, as well as other diverse groups of bilinguals and readers for whom the exploitation of letter-sound correspondences is not beneficial. Results from this project will inform a later R01 proposal which will track the development of reading skill longitudinally and will include a more diverse group of DHH readers as well as hearing mono- and bilingual controls. This project assesses reading in DHH child signers from a strengths-based perspective, shifting focus from what these readers cannot do (e.g., hear speech sounds) to what they can do: Leverage the knowledge of their L1 to acquire an L2 via print. These results may help guide early linguistic and educational practices for DHH students to optimize literacy achievement.