why it’s important for children and adults to learn new...

Why it’s important for children and adults to learn new

information and how hearing loss interferes with that learning

Andrea Pittman, PhD CCC-A

Arizona State University

© 2018 A. Pittman, all rights reserved

Children

5-14 years of age

116 Normal Hearing

99 Mild to Moderate Hearing Loss

Vocabulary Knowledge and Hearing Loss

Latto (2013) Vocabulary constraints in children with hearing loss. Honors thesis.

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Vo

cab

ula

ry A

ge (

Yrs)

Chronological Age (Yrs)

NHC

HIC


College Students

97 Normal Hearing

93 Mild to Profound Hearing Loss


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82

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120

NH HL

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dar

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core

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rest

imat

e (1

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item

s)

Actual Vocabulary Knowledge

Overestimate Knowledge

of Vocabulary

Sarchet et al (2014), Vocabulary Knowledge of Deaf and Hearing Postsecondary Students, J Postsecond Educ Disabil, 27(2), 161-178.



College Students

89 Normal Hearing

25 w/Cochlear Implants <3.5 yrs

68 w/Cochlear Implants >3.5 yrs104

7884

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NH CI<3.5yrs

CI>3.5yrs

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VT

Stan

dar

d S

core

Actual Vocabulary Knowledge

World Knowledge

(History)

Covertino et al (2014) Word and World Knowledge Among Deaf Learners With and Without Cochlear Implants, J Deaf Studies and Deaf Ed, 19;4

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tory

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re


How many words should a college student know?

The average undergraduate student knows between 15,000 and 200,000 words. (D’Anna et al, 1991)

Oxford Dictionary of American English:

~430,000 total entries

1000+ new entries each year

- new words

- new definitions to existing words

D’Anna, C.A., E. B. Zechmeister, and J.W. Hall (1991) Toward a meaningful definition of vocabulary size. Journal of Reading Behavior 23.1: 109–22.


What does this mean?

Children have a lot of word-learning to do.

50,000 words

learned over 18 years (3 to 22 years)

= 7 new words everyday

Adults need to update their vocabularies too.

1,000 words per year

= 3 new words every day


(A) The size of the English lexicon over time. Tick marks show the number of single words in three dictionaries. p. 177

Michel et al, (2011) Science, 331, 176-182

52% of the words we read in books are lexical “dark matter”;they aren’t documented in conventional dictionaries.

Michel et al, 2011 Quantitative Analysis of Culture Using Millions of Digitized Books, Science, 331, 176-182


What does this mean?

Vocabulary is dynamic.

We can’t depend on formal education to teach children all the words they will need to know and use throughout their lifetimes.

The ability to learn new words must be a life-long skill.


When do we learn new words?

Children School

Home

Friends

Activities

Social Media

AdultsOn-the-job training

Learning a second language

Medical terminology

Meeting new people

Traveling to new places

Scientific meetings


Auditory Learning Tasks

Word Recognition

Lexical Decision

Non-Word Detection

Rapid Word Learning

How well they can recognize words they already know

How well they can recognize words they don’t know

How well they can detect words they don’t know in context

How rapidly they can learn new words


Non-Word Detection 2.0

# of

nonsense

words

Example phrase

0 Clocks tick on time.

1 Birds rike long worms.

2 Dats catch slow bice.

3 -

4 -

Pittman & Daliri (in press) Vocal biomarkers of mild-to-moderate hearing loss in children and adults: Voiceless sibilants, JSLHR


Non-Word Detection 2.0

Pittman & Daliri (in press) Vocal biomarkers of mild-to-moderate hearing loss in children and adults: Voiceless sibilants, JSLHR

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Hea

rin

g Le

vel (

dB

HL)

Frequency (kHz)

Aided SFUnaided SF

Group Age (yrs) n

Children w/HL 8-17 22

Adults w/HL 55-80 23

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et S

ensi

tivi

ty (

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Target - 5 dB Sensitivity (d’)


Rapid Word Learning

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PER

FOR

MA

NC

E (%

Co

rrec

t)TRIALS

𝑃𝑐 = 1 − 0.80𝑒−𝑛/𝑐

Learning Speed:3 = 1 trial (perfect learning)2 = 10 trials1 = 100 trials0 = 1000 trials (no learning)


Rapid Word Learning

18

363

12

3980

1

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NH HL

Lear

nin

g Sp

eed

(lo

g 1

00

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)

ChildrenAdults

Pittman et al (2017) Detecting and Learning New Words: The Impact of Advancing Age and Hearing Loss, AJA, 26, 318-327.

Unaided

Group Age (yrs) n

Children w/NH 8-12 20


Adults w/NH 50-67 15



Rapid Word Learning

363

133

398

211

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Unaided NB Amp

Lear

nin

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eed

(lo

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ChildrenAdults


Group Age (yrs) n






Rapid Word Learning

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Lear

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Group Age (yrs) n






Summary

Learning new information is as important to adults as it is to children.

There are more words in a language than a person can possibly learn in a lifetime.

Because new words are created rapidly, learning new words is essential to everyday communication.


Summary

Word learning is like riding a bike.Older adults with normal hearing can learn new words as well as children with normal hearing.

Uncorrected hearing loss breaks the bike.Impedes the learning process

Limits vocabulary size

Reduces world knowledge

Correcting hearing loss with amplification fixes the bike for children and adults.


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