posted on 2019-08-09, 22:49authored byKathryn Crowe, Mark Guiberson
Purpose: Many educators and speech-language pathologists have difficulty providing effective interventions to the growing population of d/Deaf and hard-of-hearing (DHH) learners who use more than 1 language. The purpose of this review article was to identify evidence-based interventions for speech, language, and literacy used with DHH multilingual learners (DMLs), monolingual DHH learners, and hearing bilingual learners without hearing loss. Interventions used with these groups can inform the practice of professionals providing services to DMLs.
Method: This review article considered speech, language, and literacy interventions used with DHH and hearing bilingual learners from birth to 21 years of age. The following electronic databases were searched: Academic Search Complete/EBSCO (CINAHL, Education, ERIC), Linguistics & Language Behavior Abstracts, PsycINFO, and PubMed. Data describing article, participant, methodological, and intervention variables were extracted from studies. The methodological quality of studies was examined using the Council for Exceptional Children’s (2014) standards for evidence-based practice in special education.
Results: A total of 144 studies were reviewed, describing over 9,370 learners aged 1.8–22.0 years. Two studies investigated DMLs, 76 investigated DHH learners, and 67 investigated hearing bilingual learners. A total of 146 different interventions were examined. Most studies reported positive effects. Only 17 studies met all quality indicators specified by the Council for Exceptional Children (2014): 7 examined DHH learners, and 10 examined hearing bilingual learners. There was insufficient evidence for any intervention to be considered an evidence-based intervention, although 6 could potentially contribute to evidence-based practice.
Conclusions: No evidence-based interventions for DMLs were identified. A small number of interventions examined in high-quality studies of DHH and hearing bilingual learners were identified, which may be appropriate for use with DMLs following further investigation.
Supplemental Material S1. PRISMA table: Documentation of how this systematic review addressed each element of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) checklist.
Supplemental Material S2. Search strategy: Documents the search terms and limits used for each electronic database searched and the number of hits that were received for each term combination.
Supplemental Material S3. Study information: Table summarizing key article, participant, methodological, and intervention information from each of the 144 studies included in this review.
Crowe, K., & Guiberson, M. (2019). Evidence-based interventions for learners who are deaf and/or multilingual: A systematic quality review. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 28, 964–983.
Publisher Note: This article is part of the Forum: Innovations in Clinical Practice for Dual Language Learners, Part 1.