This study compared levels of social competence and language development in 74 young children with hearing loss and 38 hearing peers aged 2.5-5.3 years. This study was the first to examine the relationship between oral language and social competence using a dynamic systems framework in children with and without hearing loss. We hypothesized that, due to deficits in oral language, children who were deaf would display lower levels of social competence than their hearing peers. Furthermore, language age would predict social competence scores. Social competence was measured with a general and deaf-specific measure. Results showed that children with hearing loss performed significantly worse than hearing peers on the general measure but better than the norms on the deaf-specific measure. Controlling for maternal education and income, regression analyses indicated that hearing status and language age predicted social competence in both groups. Among children with hearing loss, correlations were also found between age at diagnosis, age at amplification, and two of the general social competence measures. Results supported our hypothesis that deficits in language would have cascading negative effects on the development of social competence in young deaf children. Development of early intervention programs that target both language and social skills are needed for this population.

These results suggest that children using cochlear implants perform similarly to hearing peers on measures of intelligence, but those with severe comorbidities are at-risk for cognitive deficits. Despite the strong link between socioeconomic status and intelligence, this association was no longer significant once spoken language performance was accounted for. These results reveal the important contributions that early intervention programs, which emphasize language and parent training, contribute to cognitive functioning in school-age children with CIs. For families from economically disadvantaged backgrounds, who are at-risk for suboptimal outcomes, these early intervention programs are critical to improve overall functioning.

CI-specific HRQoL instruments have now been developed for school-age children with CIs, with an accompanying parent-proxy version. After a psychometric validation, these CI-specific measures will enable us to track long-term outcomes, evaluate the efficacy of interventions to improve CI use (e.g., single versus bilateral implantation, AV therapy, maternal sensitivity training), and provide a profile of the "whole child's" functioning to facilitate care.

Objective: To examine sources of stress for fathers of children with congenital heart disease (CHD) and opportunities for intervention to prevent or reduce paternal mental health problems.Design: Qualitative study using online crowdsourcing, an innovative research methodology to create an online community to serve as a research sample.Setting: Yammer, an online social networking site.Subjects: Geographically diverse sample of 70 parents (25 fathers and 45 mothers) of young children with CHD. Interventions:Participants joined a private group on Yammer and responded to 37 open-ended study questions over a six-month period. Qualitative data were coded and analyzed using an

Children with CIs continue to display deficits in visual attention when compared to their hearing peers. Despite improvements in oral language, these problems have critical implications for academic performance and social competence. Currently, cochlear implant teams do not focus on these other dimensions of development and thus, may not be positioned to address them. Assessment of attention and behavior should be incorporated into routine, annual visits soon after implant surgery, and remediation of these deficits should be included in early intervention programs.