This conference presentation examines concept development for congenitally blind students. It presents current research on best-practice for teaching this population. Examples of strategies to reinforce understanding of body concepts, spatial awareness, and positional language, while promoting mirroring, self regulation, and purposeful movement to…

We tested the hypothesis that training a parent in wheelchair-user and caregiver wheelchair skills would improve the child's wheelchair skills. We studied an 11-year-old girl with spina bifida and her mother. The mother received 4 training sessions averaging 42.5 minutes per session, over a period of 3 weeks. The total pre-training and, 4 weeks…

The paper examines three cases of children born with brain damage (absence of corpus callosum). Common problems (attentional, cognitive, visuo-motor, and motor deficits) are noted, and the impact of secondary emotional involvement is considered. Intervention approaches with two of the children are described as inconsistent and inadequate, while…

Reviewed are chromosomal anomalies affecting one's eyes. Brief descriptions are given of the genetic etiology of bilateral retinoblastoma (malignant tumors), aniridia (absence of the iris), cataracts, congenital glaucoma, Reginitis Pigmentosa (progressive deterioration of the visual cells), Choroidermia (degeneration of the vascular coat of the…

A review of the research literature related to Williams 'elfin facies' Syndrome (a condition including mental retardation and cardiac anomalies), a case study, and the results of an early intervention program, are reported. The medical aspects of the syndrome have been reported with sufficient consistency for a profile to emerge. Psychological…

This paper briefly outlines current problems associated with chronic diseases in children and youth and provides indications for the types of future research and analysis needed to facilitate the development of solutions. In general, these problems are associated with the following: malignancies, hereditary anemias, cystic fibrosis, other chronic…

Presented are two papers from a panel discussion on prenatal diagnosis and genetic counseling with families. D. Blackston (director of the Developmental Evaluation Clinic, Decatur, Georgia) points out that a concise family history, pregnancy and birth data, developmental history, careful physical examination, and appropriate laboratory studies are…

This report discusses the magnitude of the problem of birth defects, outlines advances in the birth defects field in the past decade, and identifies those areas where research is needed for the prevention, treatment, and management of birth defects. The problem of birth defects has consumed a greater portion of our health care resources because of…

This study investigated the Stroop effect with deaf and hearing bilingual individuals and whether there is a positive relationship between the Stroop effect and English language proficiency of deaf bilinguals. The Stroop effect refers to the interference caused by incongruent semantic information in naming colors (e.g., when subjects must name the…

Emphasizing that for any known teratogen no safe dosage level exists, this case-illustrated review identifies the bases for current concern about the pollution of the environment, reflects on the promise and complexities of the emerging disciplines of behavioral toxicology and behavioral teratology, and describes existing evidence of teratogenic…

The paper examines the incidence of minor physical anomalies (MPAs) in 42 normal junior high Ss, 24 kindergarten Ss in a middle class district, 52 status and misdemeanor delinquents, 70 adolescent psychiatric patients, 32 learning disabled children, and 10 autistic children. MPAs included facial asymmetry, epicanthal folds, and geographical or…

Factors influencing the use of nonacoustic aids (such as visual displays and tactile devices) with the hearing impaired are reviewed. The benefits of tactile devices in improving speech reading/lipreading and speech are pointed out. Tactile aids which provide information on rhythm, rate, intensity, and duration of speech increase lipreading and…

The study investigated the use of phonological encoding and chunking strategies (the skimming and clustering of highly familiar material into meaningful units) with congenitally deaf students at the middle and upper levels of an oralist school as well as hearing students at the second, third, fourth, fifth, and college grade levels. Ss were asked…

Described is the development and evaluation of a prenatal instructional program designed to prevent birth defects. It is explained that the program, composed of five slide tape units on such topics as nutrition and environmental factors, was field tested and found effective with 97 participants (pregnant high school students, nursing students, and…

This paper reviews the case of Carrie Buck, who was the first person sterilized (in 1927) under a Virginia law allowing sterilization of persons identified as incompetent and likely to genetically transmit physical, psychological, or social deficiencies to their offspring. This law was later upheld by the Supreme Court in Buck v. Bell, which…