Samar Afza, Nazia Mumtaz.
Comparison of communicative intentions in children with moderate and profound hearing impairment.
Int J Rehab Sci Jan ;04(01):30-5.

Background: Pragmatic skills are considered to be those aspects of language that cannot be covered by semantic, syntax, phonology or morphology. Pragmatics is usage of language during natural discourse. Communicative intentions are part of pragmatic skills which includes one’s ability to request, comment, demand, respond, protest, gain attention or regulate conversation. Hearing impaired is prone to make pragmatically inappropriate responses, due to lack of their ability to comprehend auditory cues from the environment. Hearing impairment is a partial or total inability to hear which affect the development of language in children. Objective: The purpose of the study was to determine whether moderately hearing impaired children exhibit better communicative intention skills then profoundly hearing impaired children. Method: It was a cross sectional comparative survey, where 60 children with age range of 4-8 years were included. These children were school going, hearing aids users, had moderate or profound hearing loss and were taking speech therapy sessions for minimum duration of six months. Adapted John Tracy Pragmatics Profile was used in the form of written questionnaire which were filled by speech therapists working with hearing impaired children. Result: Independent sample t test was used to compare the results between groups. Significant difference was found between two groups on communicative intentions. Conclusion: The difference found among two groups of hearing impairment was explained by delayed development of language, difficulties in auditory perception of spoken language, avoidance due to failure and less exposure to varied pragmatic situations and strategies.

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