Pilot testing of a parent-directed intervention (Project ASPIRE) for underserved children who are deaf or hard of hearing

This pilot study explored the potential for Project ASPIRE to effect behavior change in a sample of 11 parents of children with hearing loss who were from typically underserved populations, such as families from backgrounds of low socioeconomic status or families who speak English as a second language. The study consisted of one education session, five 16-hour home audio environment recordings, and four linguistic feedback reviews. The educational session focused on child language development and early language environment enrichment strategies. Parents received ‘quantitative linguistic feedback’ on the home audio recordings to further support behavior change through increased awareness of linguistic behaviors. The audio recordings were completed with the Language ENvironment Analysis system. This system measured parental linguistic behavior (adult word count or AWC), child linguistic behavior (child vocalization count or CVC), and child–parent interactive linguistic behavior (conversational turn count or CTC). Post-intervention both CTC and CVC had increased significantly compared to pre-intervention recording counts (p < 0.01; p < 0.05). Increase in AWC trended towards significance between pre- and post-intervention recordings (p < 0.1). These preliminary findings support ‘quantitative linguistic feedback’ as a viable behavior change strategy for enriching children’s early language environments through parental linguistic behaviors.