The conversational skills of school-aged children with cochlear implants

Abstract

Rather than being characterized by frequent conversational breakdown as in older studies, children with cochlear implants had a strong grasp of basic conversational rules. They conversed in a similar way to some deaf adults who also have been shown to take control of the conversation. Findings are discussed for their implications for intervention and future research.

Reasons for Language : Language and Analogical Reasoning Ability in Children with Cochlear Implants and Children with Typical Hearing

“…The expressive language ability of children with CIs has been found to be associated with cognitive abilities, such as non-verbal intelligence (Cupples et al, 2018). This is both in accordance with results found for children with TH (van der Schuit et al, 2011) and the usage-based model of language acquisition (Behrens, 2009;Tomasello, 2009). Non-verbal intelligence measures are in large parts relying on analogical reasoning tasks (e.g.…”

“…Gentner and Christie (2010) argue that analogical reasoning and language have a reciprocal relationship. Analogical reasoning is an important skill for generalization and categorization, two abilities that are essential for language learning according to usage-based models of language acquisition (Behrens, 2009;Tomasello, 2009). Language, on the other hand, has been found to boost analogical reasoning ability (Baldo et al, 2010;Gentner, 2016).…”

“…The usage-based model of language acquisition assumes that children are able to acquire language from the language input they receive using general cognitive functions (Behrens, 2009;Tomasello, 2009). Tomasello (2009) argues that language acquisition can only be understood starting with the process of communication. He argues that children do not aim to understand single words or specific syntactical constructs, but want to understand what a speaker wants to communicate with an utterance.…”

“…To do so, a child needs to first understand the overall function of the utterance and then, in a second step, the functions of the sub-components of the utterance. Two important cognitive functions for this are intention-reading and pattern finding (Tomasello, 2009). Intention reading refers to the ability to understand the common ground of a conversation and to use joint attention.…”

O Impacto do Implante Coclear na Linguagem Oral das Crianças com Surdez Congénita

“…11,12 Um número crescente de estudos sobre crianças utilizadoras de implante coclear documenta que elas podem adquirir vocabulário e as estruturas sintácticas necessárias para comunicar através da linguagem oral como as crianças normo-ouvintes. [13][14][15][16][17] Alguns dos métodos utilizados para investigar os benefícios do implante coclear na linguagem das crianças com surdez neurosssensorial profunda implantadas, consistem na utilização de padrões de comparação que permitam confrontar o desempenho linguístico actual da criança com implante coclear com o seu desempenho linguístico obtido em fases anteriores. 14,15,18 Outros relacionam a linguagem da criança utilizadora de implante coclear com a de outras crianças com surdez profunda não implantadas [19][20][21]26 ou comparam o desempenho actual da criança com o desempenho dos seus pares normo-ouvintes, com a mesma idade auditiva ou cronológica.…”