Digest in English The master thesis called Hearing parents - Deaf child addresses issues concerning the specific situation of hearing parents with a hearing-impaired child. It deals with the main influences affecting what parents experience in this state of affairs. Based on Czech and foreign resources, the thesis specifies both theoretically and practically these influences on parental experiences. Firstly, general aspects which affect experiences in relation to any type of child's disability are introduced, with particular focus on specifics in case of hearing impairment. Secondly, those occurrences are described which parents are confronted with only if they raise a hearing-impaired child. The theoretical part deals with the etiology of hearing impairment and with abnormal features in child development, with emphasis on the field of communication. Further, it pursues the subjects of education and cochlear implants. Feelings and experiences of families with deaf children are also explored. Moreover, the system of care for children with hearing impairment and their families is examined. Finally, a short overview of the life of the Deaf is presented. In the practical part, the results gained from an analysis of six interviews with parents are presented. This part attempts to record how the parents of deaf...

Magister Artium (Social Work) - MA(SW) / Overwhelming evidence suggests that 90% of children with a hearing loss are born to hearing parents. Research indicates that often these hearing parents are ill-informed about the cause and type of hearing loss their child has, leading the hearing parents to feelings of grief and disempowerment. Many hearing parents at the time of the diagnosis experience emotional turmoil as the diagnosis is often unexpected, resulting in a plethora of questions asked. The research approach for the study was qualitative in nature as it set out to explore and describe the experiences of hearing parents of their child’s hearing loss. A phenomenological strategy of design was employed to capture the lived experience from the hearing parents. Data was collected by means of unstructured individual in-depth interviews with 11 hearing parents. Volunteer and snowball sampling were implemented so as to access hearing parents whose children had been diagnosed with hearing loss. Data was analysed according to Creswell (2007) and Klenke (2008) and the trustworthiness of the qualitative study was evaluated against the criteria that Guba described in Krefting (1991). Ethical considerations, such as voluntary participation, informed consent, confidentiality, anonymity, no harm done and debriefing, were adhered to. After the conclusion of the research analysis, the findings of the research were discussed and recommendations were made. The findings of the recommendations spoke to the better understanding of the emotions and challenges of hearing parents as well as putting forward suggestions for supportive coping mechanisms to be put in place to support hearing parents whose children have been diagnosed with a hearing loss.

This study, which utilized a mixed methods approach, is the first research study in Ukraine which explored the experiences of parents raising deaf or hard of hearing children. The outcome of the study includes a documented analysis and synthesis of the perceptions held by Ukrainian-hearing parents raising young deaf or hard of hearing children regarding the emotional and communicational impact of the diagnosis on their family functioning, their perceptions of existing services and/or programs, and their perceptions of the relationships with professionals. Three hundred and twenty-five families whose young children were enrolled in grade 0/1 in 48 residential schools for children with hearing loss across the country were sampled in a survey of the study and 17 families from among this number volunteered for follow-up interviews. The emotional impact of the diagnosis on the parents and other family members as well as such factors as communication mode, availability and accessibility of professional services, access to information on deafness, and educational choices were explored along with demographic and other characteristics. Parental thoughts and views in this study were consistent with international perspectives of parents that are documented in the literature: the need for informational support, guidelines and communication options for families were seen to be key factors. The responses of the participants of this study confirmed that greater access to educational options, support for overcoming stress and improving emotional well-being, as well as support for families in establishing healthy family interactions and empowering parents were among their most important requirements. Additionally, the findings of this study, stress the importance of focusing on family resources and family appraisal as key factors in the hearing family adaptation process to having children who are deaf or hard of hearing. / Special Education

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Childhood disability increases parental stress. Research on the laterality of childhood hearing loss or presence of a cochlear implant(s) as it relates to stress in hearing parents was limited before this study. The purpose of this quantitative study was to identify relationships between the independent variables of laterality (unilateral and bilateral) of a childhood hearing loss or presence of a cochlear implant(s) and the dependent variable of stress in hearing parents. Family systems theory provided a framework for viewing each member of the family as a part of a whole, whose life events, feelings, and actions affect all of the members of the family. For this study, hearing parents of children with a hearing loss living and receiving services in the state of South Carolina rated their personal stress levels by completing an anonymous Likert-scale questionnaire. Data were collected from 151 participants via an online hosting site and analyzed using factor analysis, descriptive statistics, and ANOVA procedures. Hearing parents of children with a cochlear implant(s) (n = 37) scored the highest on all measures of stress except those measuring communication stress. Hearing parents of children with a bilateral hearing loss (n = 56) scored highest on communication stress. Hearing parents of children with a unilateral hearing loss (n = 58) scored lowest on all measures. One of the largest contributing factors to parental stress was the differing opinions educators and medical providers. The findings of this study contribute to positive social change by providing insight into how a childhood hearing loss influences stress in hearing parents. This information may help educators, service providers, and families provide better resources to the family system.

The aim of the master's thesis is in-depth exploration of possibilities of using the Video Home Training method within a family setting and with motivation to support the development of communication between the child with hearing impairment and his hearing parent. The first part of the thesis creates a background for this research, psychological aspects of the care for a deaf child are being described, along with the demands for mutual conversation, which is more difficult and also absolutely crucial for future healthy development of the child. Foreign researches suggest that the VHT method for children with a hearing impairment and their parents can very effectively strengthen the development of communication, to which a research project follows up. Its goal is to apply VHT method within the described type of family. For the research, a case study design was used, and by using a VHT, a semi-structured interviews and self reporting scales, possibilities and limits of VHT method used in the family were evaluated. This evaluation proved to be very positive and at the same time it is in a consonance with findings of foreign studies. Submitted case study and its research findings contribute to the broadening of application areas in which VHT method can be used, and at the same time these findings and...

This phenomenological study investigated the nature and extent of the support parents received during IEP development. The study was informed by Bronfenbrenner's ecological systems theory. Participants, located in a Northeastern state, were 10 hearing parents of children who had been diagnosed with hearing loss at birth and were between ages 5 and 12. Data were in-depth interviews that were analyzed, coded, and organized into themes using an inductive approach to analysis informed by Hatch. Results indicated that parents believed they needed more guidance on what to expect during the first IEP meeting, that advocating for appropriate accommodations for their child was important, and that education professionals communicate in a more compassionate and less business-like manner when speaking with parents. Parents also indicated increased anxiety due to their perceptions that education professionals have inadequate knowledge about issues relating to hearing loss and hearing amplification technology. Based on these results, special education professionals and policy makers can focus on increased understanding of hearing loss and amplification use in order to help children with hearing loss achieve more positive educational outcomes effecting positive social change.

L’objectif principal de ce travail est de recueillir la parole des parents entendants d’un enfant sourd porteur d’un implant cochléaire, sur les représentations de leur parentalité de leur point de vue et sur le rôle joué par l’implant au niveau de la communication et la transmission intergénérationnelle au sein de ces constellations familiales. Le groupe d’étude était composé de 55 parents d’un enfant sourd implanté cochléaire et de 31 parents d’enfants sans handicap. Les stratégies de coping ont été explorées au moyen de l’échelle WCC-R privilégiant la dimension transactionnelle selon la théorie de Lazarus et Folkman. Les représentations de la parentalité ainsi que le rôle de l’implant dans la transmission intergénérationnelle ont été analysés par le biais d’entretiens semi-directifs. Les résultats montrent que ces familles ont tendance à mobiliser un coping plus actif que ne le font des parents d’enfants sans handicap. Ils se positionnent en règle générale sur des savoirs-action leur permettant de faire à face à des situations potentiellement aversives du fait de la surdité de leur enfant. En outre, les parents du groupe d’étude expriment une satisfaction de leur parentalité d’un enfant sourd implanté qui malgré, l’épreuve vécue au moment de l’annonce du diagnostic, se façonne au fil du temps et des expériences partagées avec leur enfant.Ils s’inscrivent pleinement en qualité de parents responsables du projet de l’implant choisi entre autres pour l’avenir de leur enfant et pour partager un sentiment d’aperception tout en cultivant pour certains, par l’apprentissage et la pratique de la LSF, la dimension culturelle naturelle de leur enfant. / The main objective of this work is to gather the voice of hearing parents of a deaf child with cochlear implant, on the representations of their parenthood from their point of view and on the role played by the implant at communication and intergenerational transmission levels within these family constellations.The study group was composed of 55 parents of a cochlear implanted deaf child and 31 parents of children without disabilities. The coping strategies were explored using the WCC-R scale, favoring the transactional dimension according to the Lazarus and Folkman theory. The representations of parenthood and the role of the implant in the intergenerational transmission were analyzed through semi-directive interviews. The results show that these families tend to mobilize a more active coping than the parents of children without disabilities. They generally position themselves on knowledge-action enabling them to deal with potentially aversive situations due to the deafness of their child. Furthermore, the parents of the study group express a satisfaction with their parenting of a deaf child with implants, which, despite the ordeal experienced at the time of the diagnosis, is being shaped over time and through experiences shared with their child. They fully embrace themselves as parents responsible for the implant project chosen – among other reasons – for their child's future and to share a sense of apperception, while cultivating for some of these parents, through the learning and practice of the LSF, the natural cultural dimension of their child.

Hearing parents of deaf children who are reliant on Sign Language need to learn to sign to ensure communication mode-match with their children. Signing is vital for parent-child interaction, and has implications for the socio-emotional well-being and educational outcomes of the child. However, poor signing skills of parents is repeatedly reported in the literature, with the majority of children in signing educational programmes reported not to be exposed to signing in the home. Teaching parents to sign therefore appears a priority, with sign teaching strategies being debated in the literature. The learning of Sign Language as a second language by hearing parents of deaf children within the bilingual educational approach, which regards Sign Language as the first language of deaf children, raises the challenges of cross-modality language learning for hearing parents. Reports on teaching methods are mainly anecdotal with only a few studies addressing sign learning by hearing individuals. While the use of graphic representations of signs is a common practice in teaching signs, there is no empirical data on their influence on the learning of signs. This study explored the contribution of graphic representations of signs in sign teaching. The main aim of the study was to describe the impact of sign illustrations on the teaching of signs to hearing mothers. Two sub-aims were formulated to compare the conditions of sign learning with and without the use of sign illustrations in graphic displays in terms of (a) sign reception and sign production, and (b) the amount and nature of assistance required in learning signs. An Adapted Alternating Treatments Design (AATD), with four theme-based sign sets, and probes balanced for equivalence, was developed and used. Four biological mothers of three boys and a girl in a Grade Three class at a day school for the deaf in an urban area of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa took part in the study. The results revealed no significant differences between the two training strategies for sign acquisition, in terms of sign reception and sign production post-training. There were however, significant differences between the two training strategies with regard to assistance required while learning signs. The graphics strategy required significantly less trainer assistance (p<0.05). In addition, there were significant differences in the nature of assistance provided with the use of graphic representations. Significantly fewer repeated demonstrations of signs were required by the participants during self practice (p<0.01). There was a significantly higher number of corrections with the graphics strategy (p<0.01) initially, and this decreased over time, unlike with the signing-only strategy. It would appear that the sign illustrations were redundant during the initial stages of sign learning using a multimodal approach, but that they were relied on to trigger recall of signs during the self practice phase. Thus, the study confirmed the supportive role of sign illustrations in sign learning. The use of theme-based graphic displays of sign illustrations emerged as a viable method in teaching signs. The implications of these results and recommendations for future research are discussed. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2009. / Centre for Augmentative and Alternative Communication (CAAC) / unrestricted