City Research Online

Abstract

The ability to distinguish lies from sincere false statements requires understanding a speaker’s communicative intentions and is argued to develop through linguistic interaction. We tested whether this ability was delayed in 26 children with severe-to-profound hearing loss who, based on vocabulary size, were thought to have relatively limited access to linguistic exchanges compared to typically hearing peers (n = 93). Children were presented with toy bears who either lied or made a false statement sincerely. Despite identifying speakers’ knowledge/ignorance, deaf or hard of hearing (DHH) children were delayed in identifying lies and sincere false statements when matched for chronological age. When matched for receptive vocabulary, observed discrepancies diminished. Deaf children who experienced early access to conversations with their deaf parents demonstrated no delay. Findings suggest limited access to linguistic exchanges delays the development of a key pragmatic skill.

Publication Type:	Article
Additional Information:	This is a pre-copyedited, author-produced version of an article accepted for publication in Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education following peer review. The version of record Ciara Kelly, Gary Morgan, Megan Freeth, Michael Siegal, Danielle Matthews, The Understanding of Communicative Intentions in Children with Severe-to-Profound Hearing Loss, The Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, Volume 24, Issue 3, July 2019, Pages 245–254, is available online at: https://doi.org/10.1093/deafed/enz001
Subjects:	R Medicine > RC Internal medicine R Medicine > RF Otorhinolaryngology R Medicine > RJ Pediatrics > RJ101 Child Health. Child health services
Departments:	School of Health & Psychological Sciences > Language & Communication Science
SWORD Depositor:	Symplectic Administrator

Export

Downloads