In a social environment composed mostly of people with typical hearing, deaf or hard of hearing (DHH) children experience social interactions differently from their typically hearing (TH) peers,... Show moreIn a social environment composed mostly of people with typical hearing, deaf or hard of hearing (DHH) children experience social interactions differently from their typically hearing (TH) peers, which could guide them towards different patterns for processing other people’s emotions. This thesis aimed to unravel whether hearing status affects how children encode, interpret, and react to others’ emotions in a social context, and whether their responses are associated with psychosocial functioning, using a variety of measures that included eye tracking, pupillometry, behavioral tasks, parent reports, and longitudinal follow-up. DHH children’s skills for perceiving others’ basic emotions were on par with their TH peers. Improved emotional functioning was associated with improved psychosocial functioning to a similar degree in DHH and TH children alike. Yet, DHH children still faced difficulties when they had to process an emotion with adequate knowledge about social rules and causes of emotions. Moreover, DHH children used a visual cue-based encoding strategy to compensate for ambiguous or unavailable information in social situations, and recruited more cognitive resources to process unfamiliar emotional expressions. The findings underscore the need to look into possible qualitative differences between typical and atypical development. These individual differences reflect compensatory strategies to support daily living, or signal a need for support in a certain domain. Show less
The aim of this thesis was to study the link between hearing loss, language skills, and social functioning in deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) children. Sufficient language skills are an... Show moreThe aim of this thesis was to study the link between hearing loss, language skills, and social functioning in deaf and hard of hearing (DHH) children. Sufficient language skills are an essential prerequisite to develop appropriate communication skills, in order to join in conversations with others. Both their hearing loss and their diminished communication skills prevent DHH children from learning by observing their surroundings (incidental learning). As a result, DHH children showed more difficulty in understanding others’ thoughts and wishes (Theory of Mind or ToM). DHH teenagers reported to have difficulties with understanding others’ emotions and showed lower levels of prosocial behavior. Higher communication skills, but not language skills, were related to better ToM development and higher empathic abilities. Second, the role of early identification and intervention of hearing loss on the social-emotional development of DHH children was studied. This was illustrated in a longitudinal study showing that early cochlear implantation resulted in higher language and communication skills. In turn, these improved skills prevented the development of early signs of psychopathology. To conclude, this thesis shows that in order to stimulate the social-emotional development of DHH children, their opportunities for incidental learning have to be increased. Show less
