Suchergebnisse

Members of the Academy of Rehabilitative Audiology were surveyed to determine their views on speechreading and speechreading tests. Although a minority of those surveyed were providing speechreading training, most considered speechreading important but were concerned about the validity and usefulness of speechreading tests. Audiologists felt a need for new speechreading tests in all age groups, ranging from preschool to older adults. Thus, there is a need for new speechreading tests to go along with the new methods of training, such as speech tracking.

Two groups of college students rated their perceptions/feelings toward older persons with hearing loss on a semantic differential scale using 25 polar adjectives. Immediately after listening to an audiotape designed to enhance empathy (Dancer & Keiser, 1980) or to the commercially available "How We Hear," which is merely informative in nature, the groups rated their perceptions/feelings again. The greater shifts in the ratings of the group listening to the empathy tape led to the hypothesis that this tape is more effective than "How We Hear" in changing attitudes toward hearing-impaired elderly persons.

Eighteen school children with unilateral hearing loss were compared to their peers through administration of the Screening Instrument for Targeting Educational Risk (SIFTER) to their teachers. Results indicate that children with unilateral hearing loss are given SIFTER scores significantly lower than their peers in all five SIFTER areas of academics, attention, communication, participation, and behavior. Such results support previous findings regarding teachers' attitudes toward students with unilateral hearing loss and indicate a need for in-service education for the classroom teacher and special attention to the educational risks of such children.

Adolescents attending 5 state schools for the deaf responded to a 35-item questionnaire designed to probe their knowledge of AIDS. The 129 students in grades 9-12 had extremely limited core knowledge of AIDS, with the correct answers to only 8 of the 35 questions known by most students in all 4 grades. A minority of males and females knew the answers to most questions, indicating that AIDS education programs for deaf adolescents are urgently needed.