Research on the acquisition of American Sign Language (ASL) by deaf autistic children has documented similarities to the linguistic profile of hearing children on the autism spectrum and has identified sign-specific phenomena that could serve as clinical markers of autism in the deaf population. However, the acquisition of a signed language by…

This article investigates the sequential recall of manual alphabet letters by signing deaf adolescents under two presentation conditions: fingerspelling and the listing and ordering technique (LOT) of American Sign Language. Fingerspelling presents each letter in a manner similar to the spelling of spoken words: A letter is produced and then is no…

Children with autism spectrum disorder present with a variety of social communication deficits such as atypicalities in social gaze and verbal and non-verbal communication delays as well as perceptuo-motor deficits like motor incoordination and dyspraxia. In this study, we had the unique opportunity to study praxis performance in deaf children…

Fingerspelling is an integral part of American Sign Language (ASL) and it is also an important aspect of becoming bilingual in English and ASL. Even though fingerspelling is based on English orthography, the development of fingerspelling does not parallel the development of reading in hearing children. Research reveals that deaf children may…

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…

This study examined 40 deaf and 20 hearing adolescent students' free recall of visually presented words varied systematically with respect of signability (i.e., words that could be expressed by a single sign) and visual imagery. Results underline the importance of sign language in the memory and recall of deaf persons. (Author/PN)

Examines the effect that hearing parents' communication methods have on the self-esteem of their deaf children. Results indicate that adolescents whose parents used total communication (speech, finger spelling, and sign language) had higher self-esteem scores than adolescents whose parents used speech only. Makes recommendations for school social…

The comprehension of 30 severely and profoundly deaf students (ages 10 to 17) was evaluated under 11 communication conditions involving individual and combined presentations of lipreading, listening, fingerspelling, and signed English. Severely deaf students scored higher than profoundly deaf students under all but one condition, and all students…