Marschark, M., Rhoten, C., & Fabich, M. (2007). Effects of cochlear implants on children's reading and academic achievement. Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, 12, 3.
This article presents a critical analysis of empirical studies assessing literacy and other domains of academic achievement among children with cochlear implants. A variety of recent studies have demonstrated benefits to hearing, language, and speech from implants, leading to assumptions that early implantation and longer periods of implant should be associated with higher reading and academic achievement.
This review, however, reveals that although there are clear benefits of cochlear implantation to achievement in young deaf children, empirical results have been somewhat variable. Examination of the literature with regard to reading achievement suggests that the lack of consistent findings might be the result of frequent failures to control potentially confounding variables such as age of implantation, language skills prior to implantation, reading ability prior to implantation, and consistency of implant use. Studies of academic achievement beyond reading are relatively rare, and the extent to which performance in such domains is mediated by reading abilities or directly influenced by hearing, language, and speech remains unclear. Considerations of methodological shortcomings in existing research as well as theoretical and practical questions yet to be addressed provide direction for future research.
Monday, October 15, 2007
Marschark, M., et. al. (2007). Effects of cochlear implants on reading and academic achievement
Are the conclusions of this article supported by its data?
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6 comments:
This review appeared to obtain a comprehensive sample of related research studies regarding the effects of cochlear implants on children's reading and academic achievement. Their conclusions did not seem biased and were solely based on the data from the studies themselves. I think they were careful not to draw the wrong conclusions, and they were specific about what aspects of cochlear implants' benefits are still inconclusive, making suggestions for future research.
Also, they discussed in detail the covariance of the characteristics of the participants, and discussed in detail which tests were administered and what they were intending to measure.
In conclusion, after reading this article, I think that their conclusions are well-supported by the data.
Yes, I thought that the conclusions of this article were supported by its data. I agreed with the authors that there needs to be better control for confounding variables in several of the studies. It appears that the large variability in outcomes from these studies may be from a failure to control for these confounding variables such as age, age of implantion, whether they used spoken, sign language or a combination, use of implantation, amount, type and intensity of therapy. It appeared that the studies that found no difference were the ones that typically did not control for these confounds.
Marschark, et. al. have completed a comprehensive review of the literature with an attempt to investigate the link between cochlear implantation and reading performance. The authors pointed out flaws in many research studies. However, I would have liked to seen a broader discussion of literacy attainment in deaf children, especially those who use ASL. The authors focused specifically on cochlear implants, and all can agree that even though many positive outcomes have been reported, more research is needed.
The purpose of this paper was to review present literature on cochlear implants and their benefits to academic achievement. I didn't feel like much of the research was "good" research however. The conclusions were that they help, but it depends on how long they were implanted and when they were implanted. Isn't this stuff we already know? Cochlear implants don't "fix" everything, they are a tool used to help hearing.
This article seemed to be a comprehensive review of valuable information, but there seem to be many loopholes in the information because of lack of control of many variables such as age, age of implantation, modality of language, etc. It had some very interesting conclusions, but more research is needed.
I felt as if the conclusions from this article were not substantiated. There were problems with the instrumentation. They were specifically trying to figure out if there is a correlation between reading scores in children with CIs verses other children. The testing measures that they used in some of the studies that were examined were not designed to look at reading. They also failed to match or provide relevant info (modality of communication, training, etc.) for the participants in many of the studies cited
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