When we speak, our ears give us feedback on the same. This, presumably, helps in learning a language and adjusting the volume of our speech. How do deaf people get this feedback to learn a new language or adjust the volume of their speech?

  • $\begingroup$ How will they watch their own lip movement , unless they stand in front of the mirror all the time? $\endgroup$ – Amit Maurya Oct 22 '16 at 21:40
  • $\begingroup$ I misread... I thought it is about feedback from others. sorry. however i've deleted previous comment. $\endgroup$ – Always Confused Oct 23 '16 at 11:06

Many "deaf" individuals still have some functional hearing. Even in the case of a total loss of hearing, there are proprioceptive cues that provide useful feedback for speech production. The typical way of teaching pre-lingually deaf children how to speak involves hours of one-on-one time with a speech-language pathologist. The child learns to speak by placing their hand on the throat/mouth of the instructor and feeling the vibrations and movements of the articulators. There is also software that process speech in near real-time and helps the talker adjust their speech to match a target pattern. These same techniques could be used for the post-lingually deaf. That said, I think it is pretty rare for post-lingually deaf individuals to learn a second spoken language.

  • 1
    $\begingroup$ Do you have some references that may back up your statements? $\endgroup$ – Robin Kramer Oct 18 '16 at 4:34
  • $\begingroup$ Thomas Alva Edison is one example. nps.gov/edis/faqs.htm , who was not "completely deaf" but had a very slight hearing. Many yrs ago in a science magazine I've read Edison also told continuous try to hearing faintest trace of sound gave him some extraordinary ability to hear special sort of sound... but I could not found authoritative reference. $\endgroup$ – Always Confused Oct 22 '16 at 14:05

Your Answer

