Hearing Impairment and Social Perception in Middle School

Overview

Objectives/Goals To determine if typical hearing students treat hard-of-hearing students differently than their non-impaired peers. Methods/Materials # Ten hard-of-hearing students from ages 11-13 # Ten typical hearing students from ages 11-13 # Two lists of questions-one for the typical students and the other for the hard-of-hearing students # Ten empty rooms Methods: I gathered ten typical hearing students and ten hard-of-hearing students. I made sure that half of the typical hearing students were aware of the hard-of-hearing students# hearing losses, and made sure that the other half were not. I organized the students into pairs, with one typical hearing student and one hard-of-hearing student in each pair. I had each of the groups talk in a five-minute conversation, then took each student aside and asked them questions. Results I confirmed my hypothesis: that typical hearing students treat hard-of-hearing students differently (isolating them, alienating them, etc.) when they knew that the student was hard-of-hearing. Conclusions/Discussion My hypothesis was proven correct. The majority of typical hearing students admitted that they would treat hard-of-hearing students differently if they had known if the student was hard-of-hearing or not. My experiment was not affected by uncontrolled events. I am extending my project by developing a curriculum that will teach typical hearing students how to better interact with hard-of-hearing students. Conclusion: The majority of typical hearing students (who had no knowledge of the hearing losses) admitted that they would treat hard-of-hearing students differently if having knowledge that the student was hard-of-hearing or not because they wouldn#t know how to interact with these students after this information was revealed. The majority of typical hearing students would treat hard-of-hearing students differently based on having no knowledge of their hearing losses because they would believe the hard-of-hearing students to be special needs based on the way they interact with others.

Competition history

• CSEF 2011 Behavioral & Social Sciences · Entry J0413

Resources

• CSEF project summary ↗

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