Reading online in deaf and hearing young people: Do differences exist?

This pilot study explored effects of hearing loss on deaf children’s reading comprehension in an online context. Eighteen deaf secondary students, ages 12–14 years (11 with British Sign Language as their dominant language, seven with English as their dominant language) engaged in an online research comprehension task. Six age-matched hearing spoken language bilingual students served as a comparison group. All participants were identified as confident readers by their teachers. Participants were asked to “think aloud” during an online search task to provide insights into their strategies. Additionally, participants completed a battery of assessments related to reading comprehension, vocabulary, non-verbal IQ, and working memory. Overall results showed similar use of strategies across all students. Strategies applied by the most skilled readers involved drawing on prior knowledge sources, e.g. informational websites or search engines, prior knowledge of the topic, and taking the time to read and evaluate website headings before deciding which one to use as source. Participants also made use of working memory skills. Findings highlight the importance of teaching online search and evaluation skills as part of the reading curriculum in schools.

本先导性研究探究了听力损失对在线情境下聋中学生阅读理解能力的影响。研究共招募18名年龄介于12至14岁的聋中学生，其中11名以英国手语（British Sign Language）为主导语言，7名以英语为主导语言，所有参与者均完成了一项在线研究型阅读理解任务；另招募6名与该组年龄匹配的口语双语听力正常学生作为对照组。所有参与者均经其任课教师评定为具备良好阅读能力且富有阅读自信的学生。参与者需在在线搜索任务过程中采用有声思维法（think aloud），以呈现其阅读策略。此外，参与者还完成了一套涵盖阅读理解、词汇水平、非言语智商（non-verbal IQ）及工作记忆（working memory）的综合测评。整体结果表明，所有参与者的阅读策略使用模式并无显著差异。阅读能力最优的参与者所采用的策略包括调用既有知识来源（如资讯类网站或搜索引擎）、主题相关的前置知识，以及在选定目标来源前，先耗时阅读并评估网站标题。参与者同时也运用了工作记忆相关能力。本研究结果凸显了将在线搜索与评估技能纳入学校阅读课程体系的重要性。