Semantic fluency in deaf children who use spoken and signed language in comparison with hearing peers.
C R Marshall, A Jones, A Fastelli and 3 others
PMID 28691260WHAT IT FOUND
Deaf children named fewer animals on average than hearing peers, but BSL, spoken English, and sign-supported English users performed alike.
Animal naming tracks vocabulary and executive skills, not language mode.
Key findings
01Deaf children produced fewer total and fewer correct animal names than hearing children, and they produced fewer responses in each part of the timed task.
02Among deaf children, the language used for the task did not separate performance: children responding in BSL, spoken English, or sign-supported English did not differ from each other.
03Semantic fluency scores were related to expressive vocabulary and executive function, and adding deaf or hearing group did not explain additional variance after age, non-verbal reasoning, vocabulary, and executive function.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The native signer group and the sign-supported English group were small. Treat those subgroup findings with caution. Only the animal category was tested. The results may not apply to other semantic fluency categories. The deaf group had lower non-verbal reasoning scores than the hearing group. The groups were not fully matched on that measure. The sample reflected UK educational and language experiences at the time of testing. Changes in hearing technology and school placement may limit generalisation to current deaf children. This was an assessment study, not a treatment trial. It cannot show whether any intervention improves semantic fluency.
Declared interests
The supplied text does not report author conflicts of interest or a funding statement. The metadata lists non-U.S. government research support, but it does not say whether a sponsor designed or wrote the study.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that signed language causes poorer semantic fluency. The deaf children who used BSL, spoken English, or sign-supported English did not differ from each other, so language mode alone does not explain the lower animal naming counts.