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CoDAS 2021
Topics: Deafness; Humans; Language Therapy; Multilingualism; Persons With Hearing Impairments; Sign Language
PubMed: 33909844
DOI: 10.1590/2317-1782/20202020248 -
Frontiers in Psychology 2019
PubMed: 31428020
DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.01765 -
Journal of General Internal Medicine Jul 2019Patient-centered care for people with disability requires effective communication and compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
BACKGROUND
Patient-centered care for people with disability requires effective communication and compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
OBJECTIVE
To understand physicians' perspectives on communication experiences with people with disability.
DESIGN
Twenty semi-structured individual interviews. Interview recordings were transcribed verbatim for analysis.
SETTING
Massachusetts, October 2017-January 2018.
PARTICIPANTS
Twenty physicians ranging from 8 to 51 years in practice in primary care or 4 other specialties.
MEASUREMENTS
Commonly expressed themes around communication with people with disability.
RESULTS
Concerns coalesced around 4 broad categories: communication experiences with people who are deaf or hard of hearing, communication with people who are blind or have vision impairment, communication with people who have intellectual disability, and recommendations for improving communication. Although participants in this study reported various efforts to communicate effectively with patients with hearing or vision loss or intellectual disability, many gaps appear to remain, as well as instances where physicians' preferences run counter to patients' wishes and the ADA. Examples include physicians' preferences for remote, online sign language interpreters despite patients desiring in-person interpreters and suggesting that patients arrange for their own interpreters. Few educational materials are available in braille, and electronic medical records may not allow documents to be printed in large font for persons with low vision. Communicating with patients with intellectual disability raised particular concerns, with participants often preferring to interact with caregivers and minimal efforts to involve patients.
CONCLUSIONS
Effective communication is necessary for ensuring the quality of health care for people with disability, and it is legally required under the ADA. Our results suggest that important gaps may remain in ensuring effective communication, and some practicing physicians could benefit from formal training in effective methods for communicating with patients with disability.
Topics: Adult; Aged; Communication; Communication Barriers; Disabled Persons; Female; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Patient-Centered Care; Physician-Patient Relations; Physicians
PubMed: 30887435
DOI: 10.1007/s11606-019-04911-0 -
Annual Review of Linguistics Jan 2021Natural sign languages of deaf communities are acquired on the same time scale as that of spoken languages if children have access to fluent signers providing input from...
Natural sign languages of deaf communities are acquired on the same time scale as that of spoken languages if children have access to fluent signers providing input from birth. Infants are sensitive to linguistic information provided visually, and early milestones show many parallels. The modality may affect various areas of language acquisition; such effects include the form of signs (sign phonology), the potential advantage presented by visual iconicity, and the use of spatial locations to represent referents, locations, and movement events. Unfortunately, the vast majority of deaf children do not receive accessible linguistic input in infancy, and these children experience language deprivation. Negative effects on language are observed when first-language acquisition is delayed. For those who eventually begin to learn a sign language, earlier input is associated with better language and academic outcomes. Further research is especially needed with a broader diversity of participants.
PubMed: 34746335
DOI: 10.1146/annurev-linguistics-043020-092357 -
Sensors (Basel, Switzerland) Aug 2021AI technologies can play an important role in breaking down the communication barriers of deaf or hearing-impaired people with other communities, contributing... (Review)
Review
AI technologies can play an important role in breaking down the communication barriers of deaf or hearing-impaired people with other communities, contributing significantly to their social inclusion. Recent advances in both sensing technologies and AI algorithms have paved the way for the development of various applications aiming at fulfilling the needs of deaf and hearing-impaired communities. To this end, this survey aims to provide a comprehensive review of state-of-the-art methods in sign language capturing, recognition, translation and representation, pinpointing their advantages and limitations. In addition, the survey presents a number of applications, while it discusses the main challenges in the field of sign language technologies. Future research direction are also proposed in order to assist prospective researchers towards further advancing the field.
Topics: Algorithms; Artificial Intelligence; Humans; Prospective Studies; Sign Language
PubMed: 34502733
DOI: 10.3390/s21175843 -
Languages (Basel, Switzerland) Dec 2022Fingerspelling is a critical component of many sign languages. This manual representation of orthographic code is one key way in which signers engage in translanguaging,...
Fingerspelling is a critical component of many sign languages. This manual representation of orthographic code is one key way in which signers engage in translanguaging, drawing from all of their linguistic and semiotic resources to support communication. Translanguaging in bimodal bilinguals is unique because it involves drawing from languages in different modalities, namely a signed language like American Sign Language and a spoken language like English (or its written form). Fingerspelling can be seen as a unique product of the unified linguistic system that translanguaging theories purport, as it blends features of both sign and print. The goals of this paper are twofold: to integrate existing research on fingerspelling in order to characterize it as a cognitive-linguistic phenomenon and to discuss the role of fingerspelling in translanguaging and communication. We will first review and synthesize research from linguistics and cognitive neuroscience to summarize our current understanding of fingerspelling, its production, comprehension, and acquisition. We will then discuss how fingerspelling relates to translanguaging theories and how it can be incorporated into translanguaging practices to support literacy and other communication goals.
PubMed: 37920277
DOI: 10.3390/languages7040278 -
Diabetes Spectrum : a Publication of... 2022
PubMed: 35663478
DOI: 10.2337/ds21-0091 -
ENeuro 2021How does the brain anticipate information in language? When people perceive speech, low-frequency (<10 Hz) activity in the brain synchronizes with bursts of sound and...
How does the brain anticipate information in language? When people perceive speech, low-frequency (<10 Hz) activity in the brain synchronizes with bursts of sound and visual motion. This phenomenon, called cortical stimulus-tracking, is thought to be one way that the brain predicts the timing of upcoming words, phrases, and syllables. In this study, we test whether stimulus-tracking depends on domain-general expertise or on language-specific prediction mechanisms. We go on to examine how the effects of expertise differ between frontal and sensory cortex. We recorded electroencephalography (EEG) from human participants who were experts in either sign language or ballet, and we compared stimulus-tracking between groups while participants watched videos of sign language or ballet. We measured stimulus-tracking by computing coherence between EEG recordings and visual motion in the videos. Results showed that stimulus-tracking depends on domain-general expertise, and not on language-specific prediction mechanisms. At frontal channels, fluent signers showed stronger coherence to sign language than to dance, whereas expert dancers showed stronger coherence to dance than to sign language. At occipital channels, however, the two groups of participants did not show different patterns of coherence. These results are difficult to explain by entrainment of endogenous oscillations, because neither sign language nor dance show any periodicity at the frequencies of significant expertise-dependent stimulus-tracking. These results suggest that the brain may rely on domain-general predictive mechanisms to optimize perception of temporally-predictable stimuli such as speech, sign language, and dance.
Topics: Attention; Brain; Electroencephalography; Humans; Periodicity; Speech
PubMed: 34341067
DOI: 10.1523/ENEURO.0065-21.2021