Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

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Background: There are 850,000 people living with dementia in the UK; this number includes Deaf people who use British Sign Language, but little is known of their experience or how services might be improved to support them and their carers, who are often also Deaf. Deaf people are routinely excluded from reports on linguistic/cultural minorities and dementia because their status, as such, is not recognised. They are very different from the much larger population of older people who lose their hearing and may also have dementia. Aims and Objectives: i) To explore the everyday experiences of living with dementia from the perspectives of Deaf BSL users with dementia and their care partners; ii) To explore the general Deaf community's knowledge and understanding of dementia, its symptoms and impact on everyday life. Method: Three focus groups were held with a total of 26 Deaf BSL users, who did not have dementia, to gauge their knowledge about dementia and where they might go for support. Four Deaf BSL users living with dementia with five care partners took part in two semi-structured interviews 6-8 weeks apart. Data were analysed using thematic analysis, storied stories and narrative analysis. All data were collected in BSL by a Deaf researcher. ResultsLack of access to information and support in BSL impeded early recognition of symptoms, access to diagnosis, and support within the Deaf community. Personal narratives revealed Deaf people's resilience while living with dementia. Narratives challenged key concerns of personhood, citizenship and embodiment from a different perspective because Deaf people are not usually regarded as full citizens and their capacity is routinely challenged regardless of dementia. Furthermore, embodiment of communication and language is a life-long experience, not residual adaptation. Visual strategies to support agency were also documented. Conclusions: The Deaf community needs provision of accessible and understandable information about dementia in BSL. Mainstream dementia support services should review their accessibility of effective support for Deaf BSL users who have been diagnosed with dementia and their families. However, Deaf people with dementia remain resilient and positive about their everyday lives with the support of their familial relationships.

This study was conducted to investigate change (as measured by positive growth changes in total personality adjustment, social maturity, and behavior patterns) in pre-school deaf children with behavioral problems who experienced short-term, nondirective play therapy. Change in behavior of these children was also investigated ten weeks after therapy.

It is evident from research studies that deaf youth in South Africa have limited knowledge or, rather, are misinformed about issues related to HIV/AIDS (Barnett & Whiteside, 2002). This is not a pure South African problem as Heuttel and Rothstein (2001) note those international studies on differences in HIV/AIDS knowledge between deaf and hearing youth indicates that deaf youth do not have the necessary knowledge about HIV/AIDS. To address this problem the South African government made a commitment to render and strengthen effective HIV/AIDS education to deaf learners (The White Paper 6 on Inclusive Education, 2001). Therefore, this study was aimed at exploring deaf youth’s perceptions about HIV/AIDS, the impact of HIV/AIDS, as well as the role that deaf youth play in the fight against HIV/AIDS in schools. A qualitative research approach was used for this study and a convenience sample of forty participants from two schools for the deaf in the Eastern Cape Province was used. The sample comprised twenty learners from each school, ranging from 14-21 years of age. Interviews were used as a data collection tool. The study has four findings, that is: deaf youth do not have critical knowledge about HIV/AIDS; deaf youth access information through conversations (with peers) and television; life skills teachers put more emphasis on religious education than talking explicitly about HIV/AIDS and discussions about HIV/AIDS are seldom held for fear of stigmatisation and due to various perceptions about HIV transmission. The study concludes that it is imperative for deaf youth to have the right knowledge and skills to reduce their vulnerability to HIV/AIDS therefore; this dissertation recommends that there is a need to address issues related to knowledge improvement, access to information and the social stigma against HIV/AIDS. The study further notes that there is a need to research, reasons why HIV/AIDS is not incorporated in all learning areas; other factors that may be causing teachers not to be able to offer in-depth HIV/AIDS education to deaf youth and to determine the extent to which SLED materials are being put to use by teachers of deaf learners.

In this study, five deaf individuals with cochlear implants were presented with noise that was manipulated systematically, to test the hypothesis that deaf persons using cochlear prostheses will demonstrate intensity regulation of their vocal output that is more appropriate when their implants are turned on than when turned off. The intensity of their vocal output was measured to determine if they demonstrated a Lombard response, that is, a systematic increase in vocal intensity with increasing intensity of background noise. Results from the study were mixed. With implants on, three subjects made systematic increases in vocal intensity with increasing background noise, while two subjects did not make such increases. In addition, the relation between intensity of vocal output and background noise was closer to the normal function for the three subjects who demonstrated a Lombard response. The "normal function" was defined by measuring the vocal intensity responses of five normal hearing control subjects who performed the same tasks as the experimental subjects.

Mentally retarded children demonstrate an abnormally high incidence of hearing impairment, and many, particularly those with IQs below 40, are difficult for audiologists to test. Consequently, there is great need among this population for investigating response modes and conditioning of responses to auditory stimuli. A review of the literature reveals no studies of echoic vocalization as a conditioned response mode to pure tone stimuli among the retarded. In this study, a heterogenous sample of 13 moderately and severely retarded children ranging in age from 7 years 7 months to 16 years 3 months were compared on two response modes to suprathreshold pure tone signals of 500 and 4000 Hz: (1) dropping poker chips, and (2) echoic vocalization (EVR). All subjects received both treatments but were divided into Groups A and B, the former receiving Treatment One (object dropping) first, the latter receiving Treatment Two (EVR) first. Operant procedures combined social and tangible reinforcement in each treatment to achieve stimulus control without specific verbal instructions. EVR included two unusual stages: (1) conditioning of imitations to the experimenter’s vocalizations, usually /a/ and (2) conditioning of response transfer from vocal to pure tone stimuli. Acquisition and extinction to first 500, then 4000 Hz proceeded sequentially within each treatment. Acquisition criterion for vocal and pure tone stimuli was eight consecutive responses. Extinction criterion was failure to respond to six out of eight tonal stimuli following withdrawal of reinforcement. Eleven of the 13 children achieved acquisition criterion for both response modes, with only three of the older subjects encountering substantial difficulty in response transfer in Treatment Two. Differences in acquisition data between treatments were not significant. Three times as much extinction occurred with EVR in Treatment Two than with object dropping in Treatment One, but there was a tendency toward more false responses in the latter mode. Otherwise, data up to achievement of extinction criterion in the extinction phases did not differ significantly between treatments Order of presentation of treatment and frequency of the pure tone stimuli were not significant factors in the results. It was concluded that despite substantially greater occurrence of extinction following withdrawal of reinforcement as compared with object dropping, echoic vocalization response has been shown to be an effective, practical response mode to suprathreshold pure tone stimuli among the children in this sample. It was recommended that further investigation with EVR be directed toward: (1) the feasibility of eliminating response transfer by use of verbal assistance and direct conditioning of EVR to pure tones; (2) if response transfer is necessary, comparison of older and younger retardates on that procedure; (3) the possibility of increasing resistance to extinction in EVR through visual reinforcement; (4) comparison of EVR and object dropping on threshold determination among MR children; (5) the practicability of paring EVR and object dropping response modes; and (6) investigation of other forms of both breath expulsion and breath inspiration as response modes to pure tone stimuli among mentally retarded children.

In my diploma thesis I deal with the problematic of people with hearing impairment. I introduce Deaf culture to Czech theological reflection and then concrete Christian communities in the Czech Republic, where deaf people gather. I analyze specifics of these communities, what is the role of the deaf people and using of sign language. I end up with theological reflection from the perspective of people with disabilities and then I introduce specifics of theology from the perspective of the Deaf. Keywords Hearing Impairment, Deaf culture, Deaf studies, Disability Theology, Deaf Christian Communities, Deaf Theology

"September, 2002" / Bibliography: p. 175-190. / 190 p. : ill. (some col.), plates (some col.) ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / In this thesis, a methodology is devised for the segmentation of the face and hands in sign language video sequences. As well as an improved coding performance, the content-based representation of video data would allow other functionalities, such as improved error-robustness and scalability. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, 2002

Thesis (M.(Augmentative and Alternative Communication))--University of Pretoria, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references.