The major purpose of this study was to determine the effect of two mediational strategies, labeling and rehearsal, on the short-term memory of prelingual deaf children. The research question answered by this investigation examined whether inducing the use of a mediator was affected by age and the serial position of stimulus items presented.The population of prelingual, severely and profoundly deaf children of normal intelligence were screened for overt production of existing mediational techniques. Thirty-three nonproducing subjects were randomly assigned to three treatment groups at four age levels. Two groups were taught memory strategies, and the third group acted as a control. A single null hypothesis was tested using a 3x4x4 analysis of variance with repeated measures on the last factor. The .05 level of significance was predetermined as the critical probability level for rejecting the hypothesis.FINDINGS1. Differences in recall performance of prelingual deaf children who (a) were induced to label, (b) were induced to cumulatively rehearse, and (c) had no induced strategy did not vary as a function of age and serial position.2. Deaf children's performance on short-term, visual sequential memory tasks is a function of the type of preferred memory strategy and age.3. No differences in performance at the serial positions occurred as a function of age.4. The type of memory strategy used by prelingual deaf children did not result in differences in performance as a function of serial position.5. The youngest deaf children who rehearsed and labeled enhanced recall significantly better than those children who were taught no strategy.6. Most older subjects taught to rehearse recalled significantly better than the children taught to label and those who were not taught a memory technique.7. Late intermediate deaf children who rehearsed recalled better than those children taught to label, but not significantly different from those taught no strategy.8. The relationship among serial position levels showed primacy and recency effects on the memory curve.CONCLUSIONS1. The cognitive processes used by deaf children are similar to those used by hearing children.2. Cognitive processes used by deaf children are utilized for similar purposes as those used by hearing children.3. Deaf children appear to display a production deficiency with regard to the use of mediational strategies. / Department of Special Education
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:BSU/oai:cardinalscholar.bsu.edu:handle/181876 |
| Date | January 1988 |
| Creators | Wheeler, N. Jill |
| Contributors | Merbler, John B. |
| Source Sets | Ball State University |
| Detected Language | English |
| Format | xiii, 197 leaves : ill. ; 28 cm. |
| Source | Virtual Press |
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