Researchers examining the structure of questions in signed languages, often using elicited data from informants, have proposed that there are specific manual and nonmanual actions produced by signers to indicate different question types (e.g., Zeshan 2004), for example, raised eyebrows for polar questions. In the current study, we add to this body…

Between 30 and 50% of individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) do not develop vocal language deemed functionally acceptable to meet their daily communication needs. As a result, individuals with ASD may require intervention alternatives to vocal speech, such as augmentative and alternative communication (AAC). However, very little is known…

Signing systems that attempted to represent spoken language via manual signs -- some invented, and some borrowed from natural sign languages -- have historically been used in classrooms with deaf children. However, despite decades of research and use of these systems in the classroom, there is little evidence supporting their educational…

Deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) literature, including the reading behaviour of Deaf adults, suggests that Teachers of the deaf (TODs) read different amounts of text during read alouds to DHH prereaders based on the spoken and visual communication modes DHH prereaders use, such as: American Sign Language (ASL), only spoken English (speech),…

Deafblind readers are heterogeneous in reading skill acquisition. This qualitative study uses in-depth interviews and protocol analyses and queries the three deafblind adult participants in describing their metacomprehension, metacognitive and metalinguistic strategies used when reading different types of text. Using retrospective analysis, the…

Reported are data obtained from a questionnaire survey of 152 deaf adults. Subjects were questioned concerning medical and audiological history, communication abilities and preferences, and educational, vocational, and social backgrounds. (Author)

A three-month project in which a blind hearing adult learned manual communication techniques for the deaf is reported. The instructional methods and reactions of teacher and student are presented. Finger spelling proved more useful than American Sign Language for the blind person as it enabled the blind user to follow English syntax. (PMJ)

Signs selected from lists used in studies with mentally retarded and autistic children and previously rated for visual iconicity were presented tactilely to 13 blind adults and adolescents. Visual and tactile ratings were found to be very similar across blind, deaf, and hearing-sighted adults and hearing-sighted children. (Author/CL)

Six profoundly mentally retarded adults were trained to use 10 signs. Two Ss learned all signs with 100% accuracy without verbal prompting; four Ss learned seven to eight signs, varying with stimulus cue and setting. It was suggested that the four Ss may not have possessed adequate cognitive ability. (CL)

A model is proposed to explain when communication in the manual modality will assume grammatical properties and when it will not. An experiment with 16 hearing adults suggests the necessity of segmentation and combination in all communication. Manual communication need not be characterized by grammatical properties only when it accompanies speech.…

Aphasic adults (N=16) with severe auditory comprehension impairment were evaluated for comprehension of redundant and nonredundant spoken and/or gestured messages. Results indicated redundancy was not reliably superior to spoken messages alone. (Author/DB)

This study of eight severely mentally retarded nonverbal adults examined the form and function characteristics of intentional communication acts. Subjects who engaged in only contact gestures produced no protodeclarative type communication acts, whereas subjects who used distal as well as contact gestures produced some protodeclaratives.…

A study involving five speaking and five non-speaking moderately/severely retarded adults revealed few differences in the ways either group revised or failed to revise their messages. Both groups were highly responsive to listeners' requests for clarification, although they tended to repeat their ambiguous messages rather than revising them. (CL)

Presents study designed to determine whether interruption in the use of the manual encoding modality would retard learning in prelingually deaf subjects. One group of students used finger spelling and finger numeration in learning eight pairs of number-word combinations while the other group used no manual encoding. Results show groups using…

The manual examines ways in which nonprofessional group home health care workers can enhance the communication and interaction skills of developmentally disabled clients. The communication process is explored in terms of information exchange, both verbal and nonverbal. Examples of vocal, nonvocal, and echolalic speech are offered and suggestions…