Developmental outcomes of early-identified children who are hard of hearing at 12 to 18months of age

Loudness and acoustic parameters of popular children's toys

“…Some propose that chronic noise exposure during childhood affects basic language functions that may damage the process of reading acquisition [29,30]. Hearing impairment may disrupt a child's development in speech perception, listening comprehension educational, psychological, and social development [6,7]. These effects may be small in magnitude; however, they should not be neglected because there is a possibility of longstanding cumulative risk factors that may lead to hearing loss [31,32].…”

“…Hearing loss in children can lead to academic, psychosocial, and developmental problems [6,7]. Some suggest that even a unilateral hearing loss and mild bilateral hearing loss can lead to stunted psychoeducational development [8].…”

Social skills in preschool children with unilateral and mild bilateral hearing loss

“…More recent studies that include early identified HH children convey mixed findings regarding developmental outcomes; Topol, Girard, St. Pierre, Tucker, and Vohr (2011) reported more signs of withdrawal and internalizing symptoms, whereas Stika et al (2015) found developmental outcomes to be within the normal range.…”

“…Further, it may be due to lack of knowledge concerning the need for early intervention, as the vast majority of research concerning the effect of early intervention addresses mainly children with severe and profound hearing loss (see for example Kasai, Fukushima, Omori, Sugaya, & Ojima, 2012;. In particular, studies of psychosocial development in early identified children with mild to severe hearing loss are few and far between; although some studies do report better developmental outcomes in children with early identified UMHL as well as in HH toddlers (Stika et al, 2015). In this thesis, age at detection and its relation to psychosocial functioning was studied in Paper I.…”

“…Although older research suggests similar difficulties for HH children (Prior, Glazner, Sanson, & Debelle, 1988), newer research on infants and toddlers has been inconclusive. To illustrate, Stika et al (2015) recently found that early identified HH children displayed social competence scores comparable to TH peers at the age of 12-18 months. In contrast, Topol, Girard, St. Pierre, Tucker, and Vohr (2011) found more symptoms of withdrawal and internalizing problems in children aged 18-24 months.…”