Evaluating the bilingual advantage in children with hearing loss

Abstract

This study evaluated a theory that identifies a phonological awareness advantage in normal hearing, Spanish-English bilingual children compared to their monolingual peers, and this theory’s consistency when applied to children with hearing loss. There are two possible explanations of a phonological awareness advantage for bilingual children: that the advantage is specific to phonological awareness as a result of learning phonologically similar languages (e.g., Branum-Martin et al., 2012) or that the advantage is a consequence of globally improved executive function tasks (e.g., Bialystok, 2003). This study evaluated: (a) whether a phonological awareness advantage exists for bilingual children with hearing loss, (b) whether a general executive functioning advantage exists for bilingual children with hearing loss and (c) how other factors like home literacy environment or socioeconomic status might contribute to a perceived advantage. Monolingual and bilingual participants (ages 4-7 years) participated in a variety of phonological awareness and executive function tasks. Although this study sought to answer a specific question regarding group performance on experimental tasks, it provided an answer to a question that was not originally asked. Participant recruitment revealed that practice patterns may reflect a discrepancy in intervention provided to these families in the area in which this study was conducted. Results serve as preliminary evidence for future research to lead to a better understanding of the presence of a bilingual advantage in children with hearing loss, and help elucidate the mechanism of that advantage. This could ultimately provide critical information regarding ways to best educate bilingual children with hearing loss to subsidize their academic success in reaching the level of their peers.