Update On Hearing Loss

Update on Hearing Loss encompasses both the theoretical background on the different forms of hearing loss and a detailed knowledge on state-of-the-art treatment for hearing loss, written for clinicians by specialists and researchers. Realizing the complexity of hearing loss has highlighted the importance of interdisciplinary research. Therefore, all the authors contributing to this book were chosen from many different specialties of medicine, including surgery, psychology, and neuroscience, and came from diverse areas of expertise, such as neurology, otolaryngology, psychiatry, and clinical and experimental audiology

Pedagogy And Identity In The Night Lessons Of Finnegans Wake

This thesis explores chapter II.ii of James Joyce\u27s Finnegans Wake (1939)—commonly called The Night Lessons —and its peculiar use of the conventions of the textbook as a form. In the midst of the Wake\u27s abstraction, Joyce uses the textbook to undertake a rigorous exploration of epistemology and education. By looking at the specific expectations of and ambitions for textbooks in 19th century Irish national schools, this thesis aims to provide a more specific historical context for what textbooks might mean as they appear in Finnegans Wake. As instruments of cultural conditioning, Irish textbooks were fraught with tension arising from their investment in shaping religious and political identity. Reading The Night Lessons as an Irish textbook, this thesis argues that systemized knowledge and the nationalized education that disseminates it possess a threatening capacity to shape and limit identity and experience. Joyce uses the chapter both to examine this threat and to advance modes of experience unaccounted for in systems of knowledge reliant on language—and thus unamenable to educational forces\u27 attempts to colonize identity. The thesis examines the 19th century pedagogical notion of apperception as a nexus of Joyce\u27s binding preoccupations of memory and perception, and investigates its role in the capacity of generate abstraction and metaphysics in unconscious mind as depicted in Finnegans Wake. Ultimately, this thesis reads The Night Lessons as a textbook exercising the mind\u27s malleability instead of imposing stabilizing limits upon it

Structuring effect of tools conceptualized through initial goal fixedness for work activity

Analysis of work activities in nuclear industry has highlighted a new psycho-cognitive phenomenon: the structuring effect of tools (SET) sometimes leading to unexpected operating deviations; the subject is unable to perform a task concerning object A using or adapting a tool designed and presented to perform the same task concerning object B when object A is expected by the subject. Conditions to isolate and identify the SET were determined and reproduced in experiments for further analysis. Students and seven professional categories of adults (N = 77) were involved in three experimental conditions (control group, group with prior warning, group with final control) while individually performing a task with similar characteristics compared to real operating conditions and under moderate time-pressure. The results were: (1) highest performance with prior warning and (2) demonstration that academic and professional training favor the SET. After discussing different cognitive processes potentially related to the SET, we described (3) the psycho-cognitive process underlying the SET: Initial Goal Fixedness (IGF), a combination of the anchoring of the initial goal of the activity with a focus on the features of the initial goal favored by an Einstellung effect. This suggested coping with the negative effect of the SET by impeding the IGF rather than trying to increase the subjects’ awareness at the expense of their health. Extensions to other high-risk industries were discussed

Structuring effect of tools conceptualized through initial goal fixedness for work activity

Analysis of work activities in nuclear industry has highlighted a new psycho-cognitive phenomenon: the structuring effect of tools (SET) sometimes leading to unexpected operating deviations; the subject is unable to perform a task concerning object A using or adapting a tool designed and presented to perform the same task concerning object B when object A is expected by the subject. Conditions to isolate and identify the SET were determined and reproduced in experiments for further analysis. Students and seven professional categories of adults (N = 77) were involved in three experimental conditions (control group, group with prior warning, group with final control) while individually performing a task with similar characteristics compared to real operating conditions and under moderate time-pressure. The results were: (1) highest performance with prior warning and (2) demonstration that academic and professional training favor the SET. After discussing different cognitive processes potentially related to the SET, we described (3) the psycho-cognitive process underlying the SET: Initial Goal Fixedness (IGF), a combination of the anchoring of the initial goal of the activity with a focus on the features of the initial goal favored by an Einstellung effect. This suggested coping with the negative effect of the SET by impeding the IGF rather than trying to increase the subjects’ awareness at the expense of their health. Extensions to other high-risk industries were discussed

Learning Prosody in a Video Game-Based Learning Approach

With the growth in popularity of video games in our society many teachers have worked to incorporate gaming into their classroom. It is generally agreed that by adding something fun to the learning process students become more engaged and, consequently, retain more knowledge. However, although the characteristics of video games facilitate the dynamics of the educational process it is necessary to plan a pedagogical project that includes delimitation of learning goals and profile of the addressees, the conditions of application of the educational project, and the methodologies of evaluation of the learning progress. This is how we can make a real difference between gamification and video game based learning. The paper addresses the design of an educational resource for special education needs (SEN) students that aims to help teach communicative skills related to prosody. The technological choices made to support the pedagogic issues that underlie the educational product, the strategies to convert learning content into playful material, and the methodology to obtain measures of its playability and effectiveness are described. The results of the motivation test certified that the video game is useful in encouraging the users to exercise their voice and the indicators of the degree of achievement of the learning goals serve to identify the most affected prosodic skill

Examining the validity and reliability of the Infant-Toddler Meaningful Auditory Integration Scales (IT-MAIS) via Rasch analysis

In this study, we analyzed the validity and reliability of the Infant-Toddler Meaningful Auditory Integration Scales (IT-MAIS; Zimmerman-Phillips, Osberger, & Robbins, 2001), an assessment designed to measure listening skills in children ages 0-3 years. The IT-MAIS is a caregiver report tool used by speech-language pathologists and audiologists to assess listening skills in children with sensorineural hearing loss (SNHL) pre- and post-cochlear implant (CI). The IT-MAIS is widely used; however, it has not undergone thorough psychometric analysis. Using longitudinal data collected by the University of Iowa Children’s Cochlear Implant Program, we analyzed the psychometric properties of the IT-MAIS via Rasch analysis, a 1-parameter (1-PL) model of Item Response Theory (IRT; Lord & Novick, 1968). Pre- and post- CI assessments from 23 CI users aged 10 to 36 months were evaluated. IRT is a form of psychometric analysis that is emerging in the behavioral sciences as a viable alternative to Classical Test Theory for test development and analysis. IRT results are similar, but not identical to classically derived concepts of validity and reliability. Specifically, we analyzed the content and construct validity of the IT-MAIS. We found that 2 out of 10 items exceeded misfit criteria, meaning participants did not respond predictably to these 2 items. We also found that the item-difficulty range did not capture the full range of participant ability, especially the higher range of participant ability. Therefore, the IT-MAIS may not be assessing higher-level listening skills, particularly in children post-CI. Rasch analysis also revealed that 1 of the 5 rating scale categories was not used predictably, indicating that the rating scale was not used as the test developers (Zimmerman-Phillips, Osberger, & Robbins) intended. To analyze item order relative to sequential development of listening skills, we established an a priori item rank order and compared it to item difficulty order established by Rasch analysis. Overall, our results indicated the IT-MAIS did not demonstrate ideal item-level psychometric properties according to Rasch analysis and item order did not reflect sequential development of listening skills. We concluded that the IT-MAIS should not be used to assess listening development from pre- to post-CI

The educational experiences of the deaf adolescents attending a school for the deaf in Gauteng.

This study aimed to describe the educational experiences of deaf adolescent learners attending a school for the deaf in South Africa. The specific objectives of the current study included: (a) obtaining a detailed description of the educational experiences of deaf adolescent learners; (b) establishing with which rhetoric (medical vs. cultural) the deaf adolescents could best identify; (c) establishing the potential influence on individual identity development of the established affiliations with the opposing models of deafness. Ten deaf adolescents ranging between 14 and 16 years, attending a single school for the deaf were selected as participants for the current study. A basic research design and a qualitative approach, embedded within the theory of social constructivism were employed. Two pilot studies were conducted in order to establish the feasibility of the current study. Thereafter, interviews as per the ‘interview guide approach’ were administered. Field observations within the school context and file reviews were also conducted. Thematic content analysis was employed and the identified themes were described qualitatively. Results revealed the emergence of three themes. Within these themes, the adolescents’ experiences included: limited SASL role models both at home and at school, negative educational encounters as well as positivity and hope for the future. Experiences characteristic of the medical model and socio-cultural model of deafness were reported and factors affecting these affiliations were described. The researcher concluded that a level of affiliation with both the medical and the sociocultural models of deafness existed for the participants. The impact of these affiliations on identity construction was explored and a model of identity development, the multiculturalexperience model, was proposed. The education of deaf individuals in South Africa shows room for significant growth. By adjusting government education policies for deaf education as well as supporting the goals of early intervention, deaf learners can reach their full potential regardless of the mode of communication favoured

The listening talker: A review of human and algorithmic context-induced modifications of speech

International audienceSpeech output technology is finding widespread application, including in scenarios where intelligibility might be compromised - at least for some listeners - by adverse conditions. Unlike most current algorithms, talkers continually adapt their speech patterns as a response to the immediate context of spoken communication, where the type of interlocutor and the environment are the dominant situational factors influencing speech production. Observations of talker behaviour can motivate the design of more robust speech output algorithms. Starting with a listener-oriented categorisation of possible goals for speech modification, this review article summarises the extensive set of behavioural findings related to human speech modification, identifies which factors appear to be beneficial, and goes on to examine previous computational attempts to improve intelligibility in noise. The review concludes by tabulating 46 speech modifications, many of which have yet to be perceptually or algorithmically evaluated. Consequently, the review provides a roadmap for future work in improving the robustness of speech output