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METHODOLOGY
1. 'GENERAL AH1 OF THE iJTUDY
• In the ±,amily environment, the deaf child is ..
exposed toa variety of speakers and a variety of I
natural and infol.'lll.al communication situations. The
general aim of the. study is to trac~ the emerging
patterns of communication between deaf child and his
parents and siblings within the context of the family's
socia-economic background, and analyse the influencing ,
factors as perceived by each parent, the problems each
identifies and ways of coping with these problems that
-each parent devises. ,
2. DEFINITION OF KEY TERMS AND THEORY BA;;)E •
~'irst of' all, the ait"ferenc e between impairment,
disability and handicap must be'spelt out. Impairment •
refers to any loss or abnormality of psychological,
phYSiological or anatomical structure or function • •
Disability refers to any restriction on or lack of
ability resulting from impairment to perform the
33
activity within the manner or within the range consi
dered normal for a human being. ~ica12 refers to a
disadvantage for a given individual (resulting from
an impairment or a disability) that limits, or prevents
the fulfilment of a role.that is normal depending upon
age, sex, social or cui tural factors for that 1no.ividual.
t WHO, 1981).
The "Deaf chi.J.a." has oeen clasl::lified in different
ways by different disciplines according,'to the angle , .
through which they perceive the Child. t'or the purpose
of this s;udy, the educational classification has Oean
ul::led,where deaf children are those who require education
by methods Suitable for pupils with little or no .
naturally acquired speech or language.
This study is focused on the ~re-lingual Deaf
Child that_._is, a chi..Ld who either is congenitally Cleaf
or loses his hearing prior to the acquisition of
language.
Broadly speaking, Communication is a dynamic
process through which interchange of information,
knowledge, ideas and feelings takes place between tw.
interacting individuals. This interchange can be
carried out with any form of language. Language is a
purely human, non-instinctive method of communicating
ideas, emotions and desires by means of a system of
voluntarily produced symbols. This method includes
34
the follOWing forms of communication - speech, reading,
writing, facial expressions, gestures and Signs. Speech
as ~ form of language is a motor-mental skill in which
articulate sounds or words are used to convey meaning.
Reading is the conversion of print into auditory
equivalents and their subsequent interpretation based
on previously learned oral language skills (Lloyd, J.,
1979). Writing is a form of expressive language which
is dependent on a number of preskills: the necessary
auditory and visual discriminations required for reading,
the necessary visual-motor integration needed for form
ing letters and words, and the necessary conceptual and
language functions· needed to formulate words into
patterns and sentences (Kroth, J., 1971). Facial
Expressions and Gestures are spontaneous movements
of the hands and facial muscles and are truly
35
speaking, an accompaniment of language and not
language proper. ~or the hearing-impaired, one more
form of communication has been introduced and that is
finger-spelling and signing. Finger-spelling involves
the use of a manual alphabet with a hand-finger pattern
or token for each letter of the alphabet. Signing
involves the use of a repertoire of patterned movements
of the hand and face.
One way of reducing the handica~ping conditions
is through special education programmes. ~peciab
Education refers to all special provisions made to
enable handicapped children to acquire education, whether
at home, in hospital, special or regular schools. A
Special Education Programme is one that provides direct
or indirect services of a trained. special educator who
uses a unique curriculum, a different method and
specialized instructional material (Dunn, 1973). There
are three types of educational environments for deaf
children in India:
(i) Residential schoQls - private or public;
(ii) Day schools which also provide segregated
educational facilities but do not provide
boarding facilities; and
(iii) Day classes which are usually located in
schools primarily for hearing students where
deaf students are integrated into classes with
hearing students under the supervision of
resource teachers.
36
Special education programmes in India have been
mostly using the oral method of teaching deaf children.
Oral Method refers to th€ teaching through speech and
reception through lip-reading. Reading and writing are
included for the development of language and acquisi
tion of knowledge. It also includes early ~uditor!
training or training in the use of amplified sound to •
exploit the residual hearing possessed by most deaf
children.
Let us now take a long look at the process of
communication. Human communication is said to have
occurred when an individual responds to a symbol.
But this is not a one-way but a two-way process,
in that an individual communicates with another
individual or group of individuals. This process
involves verbal and/or non-verbal symbols which are •
used intentionally or unintentionally by the source
37
who seeks to elicit a covert or overt, intentional or
unintentional response from the receiver which mayor
may not match his intent. Therefore, it is contextual
as each person influences and is influenced by the • other person or persons. ~hus, communication is
basically a process as it is a dynamic, ever-changing,
on-going phenomenon which has no fixed sequence of
events; the elements in this process act and interact;
each affects all the others.
Though every communication situation differs
in many ways from every other, Berlo (1960) has
identified certain basic elements that all of them
have in common and has prepared a model applicable to
two-person Situations. These elements are (i) the
communication source; (ii) the encoder; (iii) the
message; (iv) the channel; (v) the decoder and
(vi) the communication receiver.
This researcher has adopted Berlo's model to
observe the interaction between the elements in the •
process of communication between the deaf child and
his family. Diagram 1 shows this process. A brief
explanation of the terms used in the diagram is given
below.
At the basis of most of the encounters an
individual has with another individual, whether
spontaneous or deliberate, .:here are purposes, ideas,
reasons for engaging in communication. They prompt
38
the individual to initiate the process of communication
in order to convey the message contained in the idea.
As there can be any number of purposes or reasons for
such a process, this researcher has restricted herself
to five purposes which are basic to any communication
situation. They are (i) information exchange;
(ii) eliciting actionj (iii) explaining cause-and
effect relationship; (iv) helping child understand self;
and (y) emotional expression.
Before going further, recorded here are the
precise meaning of the terms used in Berlo's model and
their application in this study.
Di
Interd endence between the Elements in t~; Process unication between Deaf Cbild and his Fami!
1" Info rmation exchange
2, Eliciting action
J. Explaining cause and effect relationship
4, lmderstanding self
5, Emotional expression
Source -1, Mother
2. Father
J. Siblings
4. Dead child as perceived by mother
\
I Messa~
1. Verb . ca tion skill
• sp
• wr' {
2. Non.J lmmunica. tion 1.1 '
• fint ing, sigli :e
I • nat ;ures
Noise oirference ,
In tlree
1 • In ~~iver
• In thage
In trnel
• In \vironment
!~
Posi:feedback
• r egafJ'eedback
---(
Channels
Sensory organs of:
• vision
• hearing
• touch
• taste
• smell
Decoding skills ~ -1 -1
• lip reading 1, Deaf child
• reading 2, Father
• listening J. Mother
• observation· 4, Siblings
The term "source" is used for the person who
initiates communication with another person. In this
'study, the term It source" is used when talking about
either mother or father or deaf child.
The purpose of the source has to be encoded or
put in a form recognizable by others. Encoding is
40
the cerebral act of formulating a language response
for motor implementation. The vocal mechanisms used
in speech, the'motor skills used in writing and the use
of gestures or non-verbal behaviour are some
II encoding skills". '£ney have been grouped under verbal
and non-verbal skills.-
\ The concrete expression of the source's ideas
and purposes has been labeled as the "message" which has
three elements, namely, message code, message content
arid message treatment. In order to convey a message it
has to be arranged into some semblance of recognizable
order which is known as the message code and which is
usually the language used for expreSsing ideas. The
expression of this message code becomes the message
content. ~he deCision made in selecting and arranging
41
both these above two elements is known as the message
treatment. The source uses his encoding skills to
convey the message •
•
The message has to be routed across a "channel",
a medium through which to transmit messages. Here the
channel involves the five sensory organs of vision,
audition, touch, taste and smell as it is through
these five senses that an individual gains the rulL
perception of his sensory experiences. In a normal
individual, the distance senses of hearing and vision
and the close senses of olfaction, gustation and
taction work in a complementary relationship to give
him a full perception of the communication process.
But when an individual bas impaired hearing, the remain
ing distance sense vision takes on a dual lead roLe and
the close senses become more supplementary and critical
to the individual's understanding of the communication
process.
The person to whom the message is directed is
the "receiver". In this study, when the source is the
mother 0r father, the receiver is the deaf child; and
42
when the source is the deaf child, the mother or
father or siblings are the receivers. The receiver
decodes the message with the help of "decoding skills" • which are again verbal and non-verbal. Decoding is the
cerebral act of comprehenaing the meaning of an
incoming language pattern. Besides the common decoding
Skills of reading, listening and .bservation, one more
skill has been listed, namely, lip-reading or speech
reading,as it is a major decodins skill used by a deaf
child. Lip-reading is a process of understanding a
speaker's words by associating words with the movement
of the lips.
The receive.r then provides a "feedback" which
would give a clue to determining the success or failure
of the source's communication efforts. The term "nois~"
has been used for factors in any of these elements that
can reduce effectiveness of the whole process.
The core of the communication process is the
interdependence and interaction between these common
element~. This researcher has used these elements as
the baSic and focal pOints of her study and has worked
around them. In a lami~y situation, as members of
the family interact regularly with each other, patterns
nevelop in their communication from ~hich one can infer
their implicit agreements about ho~ they interact or
the operating rules which sustain family functioning • •
Fam~y communicatio~tterns are typical ways in
which family members relate to each other in various
situations. uonsequently, the objectives of the study
are woven around these elements and t~e emerging
communication patterns. HenceJorward in this
dissertation, communication patterns wi~~ Oe referred
to as (;Ps.
:5. .QBJECTlVEt:i AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS ARHlING FROM OBJECTIVBI:l
A. Objectives
Objective I: ~o stUdy the process of communica-
tion between (a) mother and deaf chi~d;
(b) father and deaf chi.La.; and
(c) deaf child and mother, father, sitllings,
in order to observe the emerging C~S.
Objective II · • To examine the factors identified
by both parents as int'luencing
communication between them and
deaf child.
Objective III: To analyse the problems in
communication perceived by bbth
ObJective IV
ObJective V
· •
parents as those affecting themselves
and d.eaf child.
To obtain parents' views on what
they themselves could do to over
come the identified prob~ems in
communication and what help, if any,
they wo~d need from others.
: To note the family's present
a tti tude towards the deaf child.
In the introauctory chapter, the need for
studying the process of communication between deaf
ChiLd and his family was outlined. The above objectives
are therefore the concrete expression of this need.
This process when traced through the basic elements
45
will bring out certain definite CPs which are the
study's tirst objective. In order to arrive at an ,
analytical understanding of these C~s it will be
necessary to examine the in!luencing Tactors. ¥or
gaining an inSight into the working of these patterns
and their stresspoints, the problems in communication
will have to be analysed. A look at the present
family reactions towards deaf child will provide a
Situational understanding of these Cis. Obtaining
parents' views on what they themselves can do to
overcome perceived problems in order to make this
interaction maXimally effective with or without out~ide
help is the final and overall purpose for undertaking
the study. This wOUld also enable this researcher and
users of this research ~o provide the necessary
services to parents. Parents' ability and success in
coping with communication problems will depend upon
their reactions or attitude towards deaf .child, the
type of CPs that emerge between them and him and vice-
versa, and the perceived ini"luencing factors and
problems. Thus the objectives are basically inter-
linked.
~. Research questions
As the objectives are essentially broad-based,
some of the specific research questions arising from
each obJective are given below:
Db j ecti ve-I
(a) .l!'or each purpose, what are the encoding skills
~combinationB of upto three skills) used to tkL .o~"c. .....
translate the purpose ofAand how, i.e. through
which channels (combination of ani three
channels) are the messages carried to the
receiver'{ What decoding skills (combination
upto three ~kil19) dOes the receiver use to
translate the message and with what effect"
The researcher has restricted herself to a
46
combination of encoding skillS of upto three
skills because finger-spelling and formal
signing method are not known to this sample of
deaf children and their families as this manual
method of communication is not being used by
any of the four selected schools. Again a
47
combination of upto three channels was decided,
because in the researcher's opinion, the
senses of taste and smell would be used as
channels for only very spe ci1"1c si tua tions.
Decoding skills were restricted upto three
combinations. because none of the parent~ in the
sampLe were deaf so none af the paFeats iB tho
sample WOFO doaf 80 none Of them wouiu neea
to ~e lip-reading as a decoding skill. The one
father who was deaf had deserted the tamily and
so was not interviewed. Moreover, it WOULd be
difficult for the ueaf child to use all for skills
Simultaneously. ~efore abking questions concern
ing the CPs,. the researcher first explained with
the help of photographs, how different combinations
of encoding skillS, channels and decoding skills
are used in different si tua tions by a dyad-group
like mother and deaf child (see Appendix lC ).
Then parents were asked to describe the combination
of skills used by them and deaf child in different
situations (see Appendix JC ).
(b9 How far is the interaction among the elements
in the communication process related to the
48
purpose and how far to the source-receiver pair'?
What are the specific patterns in the interac-
tion among the elements in the communication
process? Do the source-receiver use only
certain encoding/decoding skills irrespective
of purpose?
Objective-II
The aim here is to know the parents' perception
of the positive and negative factors influencing
communication between them and deaf child. This would
bring out their level of awa.reness of these factors
and the degree of similarity of views on this subject.
This in turn would lead to an analytical understanding
of parental perception of factors which have influenced
the emergence of different patterns. The research
questions Which bring out these data are as follows:
(a) Do parents feel that the family is able to
communicate adequately with deaf child and he .
with them? Which member is able to communicate
49
Tfiith him th<e m.cst and 'Ilhich member the least'?
With which members does deaf child communicate
the most and the least?
(b) Does the family have a common strategy for
communicating with deaf child?
(c) How far are the factors identified by parents
as influencing communication related to:
(i)
(11)
(iii)
(iv)
child's characteristics
their own
the school situation, and
social system.
(d) What is the degree of similarity and dissimila
rity between mothers' and fathers' perception
of influencing factors?
Objective-III
The stress here is on understanding the factors
perceived by eac~ parent as problematic and their
reasons for such a perception. Therefore, the research
questions are as follows:
50
(a) In each parent's opinion, which are the factors
which create problems when communicating with
deaf child?
(b) What are their reasons for perceiving the
factors as those creating problems in communica
tion?
Qbjective-IV
As mentioned earlier, obtaining parents' views
on what they themselves can do to make communication
with deaf child maximally effective is the overall aim
of the study. In order to enable professional social
workers develop effective intervention strategies, it
is necessary to know not 'only the perceived problems
but also the types of parents (i) who are able to cope
adequately with them and tii) those who are unable to do
so; the types of services that the two groups of parents
would need, and the extent of their knowledge regarding
such resources as are available in the community.
Therefore, the research question's arising from this
objective are as follo?s:
51
(a) Which problems do parents think they can over-
come with help or without help and how? Which
problems do they think they cannot overcome?
(b) How far do their plans for coping with the
identified pro.bl ems depend upon (i) their own
characteristic s, (ii) those 0 f the deaf child1
and (iii) 8pecia~ized help?
(c) What is the extent of t&e parents' knowledge
regarding the resources available in the commu
nity and which have they used or would like to
utilize?
(d) How far dO their ability to deal with identHied
problems in communication influence the extent
of communication and the CPs used by the Mother-
chil~ and Father-child dyads'!
Objective-V
Since a necessary condition for human communica-
tion is the interdependent relationship between source
and receiver, it follows that within the family each
(---Tiss LIBRARY- "
1111111111111111111111111111 i I l 063166__)
52
member affects every other member and the entire
family's stability and growth hangs on a delicate
balance of emotional interaction. An auditory disorder
precipitates a crisis which has farreaching effects on
family relationships. i'heret"ore, it wOu.L.d be useful to
note the interactions between the family and deaf child
as they influence the CPs between them. Therefore,
the research questions arising from this objective are:
(a) What is the parents' level of pirticipation in
Parents' Groups and Parent-Teacher meetings?
(b) What is the parents' level ot knowledge about
the handicap and what are theffsources of gain
ing this knowledge?
(c) How far do members a f the i'aII)ily collaborate
with each other in interacting with deaf child?
(d) What is the impact of the presence of deaf
child on family on different aspects of daily
living such as their social life, worklHe,
household duties, leisure ti~e activities,
53
marital harmony, interaction with other
children and other family members, and physical
and mental health?
(e) What are parents' expectations from deaf child?
(f) In the parents' opinion what is the extent of
child's knowledge of the consequences of his
handicap on himself?
4. SCOPE OF THE STUDY
This study focuses on the process of communica
tion between deaf child and his family. It has been
restricted to 100 school-going deaf children between the
age group of 5-14 years and thei,r families living in
Bombay. , '
Ke'eping in view this focus, this researcher has
pre-determined the source-receiver pairs as.mentioned
in an earlier section. When the source is either the
mother or father, the receiver is the deaf child and
when the source is the deaf child, the receiver is . mother, father and sibling in turn.
54
Again as mentioned earlier, since there can be
any number of purposes for communication among family
members, the study has been restricted to five purposes.
However, for each of the five purposes a variety of
different situations which are conducive to communica-
tion between each source-receiver pair have been
selected for study. A break-up of the different
communica tion 8i tua tions i"or each source-receiver pair
i"or the !'ive purposes have been given below:
Purpose I - Information Exchange
tlource --- Situations Involving
Father ~a) Talking about the day's activities
Nother at school.
tb) Inclusion of deaf child in conver-
sations during family's day-to-day
or special get-togethers, during
social viai ts of rela ti ves, friends
and others.
(e) Correctly naming things in the
environment.
Source
Deaf child (a)
Situations Involving
Relating day's activities at
school to family members.
(b) Demanding to be told names of
things in the environment.
55
Eurpose II - Eliciting action
Mother (a) Management of routine ·activi ties by
Father
Deaf child
deaf child, like looking after own
things, running errands, helping in
household chores.
(b) Explanation of disciplinary action
taken and safety measures taught.
(c) Parent's participation in play with
deaf child.
(a) Demanding expla~tion for disciplinary
action directed towards him.
(b) Expressing desire to participate in
play activities of siblings and their
friends.
(c) Requesting family member to intervene
in the event of an argument with
playmates in order to explain his
point of view.
56
furpose III - Expl~ntng Cause and Effect Rel~ionship
Source
Mother
Father
Deaf child
Situations involving
(a) Explaining the working of
mechanical things like ttys,
electric equipment, hearing
aid.
(b) Explaining the time factor in
terms of past, present and
future. Recollection of past
events, description of current
events, anticipation of future
.events.
(a) Questions concerning a.ttempts
at understanding the working
mechanisms' of things.·
(b) Attempts at recalling past events
and anticipating future ones.
57
Eurpose IV - Helping child understand self
Mother
Father
Deaf chUd
§ituations involving
(a) Explaining of restrictions
imposed only on deaf child, but
not on hearing siblings.
(b) Explaining of the consequences
of the handicap.
(a) Expressing desire to undertake
some responsible work indepen
dently.
(b) Volunteering to help members of
the family in their work.
(c) Demanding explanation regarding
differences between himself and
hearing Siblings.
PurEose V - Emotional expression
Mother 0 o
Father 0
(a) Conscious expression of love,
anger or disapproval.
Source
Deal" child
dituations invoiving
(b) Management of deaf child's
feelings of fear, insecurity
and Jealousy.
58
taJ Expression of happiness or
sadness, jealousy, fear 0 r
insecurity and frustration at
not succeeding in something.
5.· ~ELEC~ING A SAMPLE
As there is little research in the area of
interpersonal communication within the family of a deaf
child, this study is exploratory in nature.
In a city like Bombay, even a conservative
estimate of the number of deaf children is very large.
linfortuna tely, there has been no enumeration of the
deaf population in the metropolis. It would, therefore
be costly and time consuming and beyond the scope of
a fh.D. thesis to identify the deaf child and his
family in the community at large. This researcher has
consequently limited herself to deaf children
studying in special schools in Greater Bombay.
59
There are at present 18 special schoo~s in the
metropolis. With the exception of one school which
uses the Total Gommunica tion 14ethod ror teaching deaf
children, aLL the other schools use.,.the oral method
of instruction. With the exception of one school whicn
is a high school, al~ of them only have classes upto
primary or miaale levels, that is upto stannara ~ or
at the most upto standard VII. Hence the children
available for study )<ould be primary school children.
trenerally speaking)a normal hearing child of
5-9 years is in primary school. However, as the deaf
child starts his school life with inadequate speech and
language and a large proportion of school time has to be
spent on language acquisition, he takes almost doub~e
the time to cover the normal school curriculum. The
researcher, therefore, decided to tOCUtl on school-going
deaf chiLdren of 5-14 years.
Some special schools use only one medium of
60
instruction ~hich is either a regional language or
tnglish, whe~eas some schools have different sections,
each using a different medium of instruction. ~ince ~.
the focus~on examining the communication process in
family interaction, the researcher d~cided to select
equal number of children studying in a regional language
which would usually be the language spoken at home, and
the ~nglish 1anguage so as to make comparison possible
between the two groups.
AS the target population was not known, it was
decided to use the Quota t)ampling Method "as llsea !'or
selecting the sample. The Quota tlample was based on
medium of instruction and age and sex of child. An
effort was made to see that they were equally represen
ted on- all three of these variables. AS there were !'our
special schools in the city teaching in Gujarati, the
researcher decided to select all those children from
these four SchOOLS who were between 5 years to 14 years
of age. This source yielded fifty eligible children.
\7ujarati medium was selected as the researcher is !luent
in that language and this would greatly facilitate the
interview process. Two of these schools also had an
English medium section. The researcher decided to
first select children falling in the prescribed age
group from these two sChools and to go to other
English medium schools only if the required quota
61
could not be secured from here. However, it was not ,
necessary to go to other schoolS as it was possible
to select fifty eligible children falling within the
prescribed age range from these two schools alone.
The final sample size of 100 chl.ldren was
thought to be adequate in terms of the availabi~ity and
reprebenta tiveness of the s(l.mp~ing units. l'he Quotas
fixed and the actual number were as follows:
. ---Quo ta Ac tual Quota Actual
1'lea.i urn of Instruction English Gujarati
50 50 50 50
Age 5-9 years 10-14 years
50 52 50 48
l::iex Male Female
50 52 50 48
62
In actual data collection the researcher was
more particular in getting equal n~ber of children
in both media of instruction, because the discrepancy
that woUld arise in the other two cnaracteristics
would be negligible.
6. DAT!.., CO.l.d • .iSC'l'I ON
Before beginning field work, a letter was sent
to the principles of the four selectea schools request
ing permission to select some of their students as
sampling units for study and seeking their co-operation
in conducting this study. All lour schools readily
granted permission and spontaneously gave their full
co.operation through-out the data collection process.
Basic data aoout tne cnild's age, sex, details
regarding hearing loss, number of years spent at scho,ol
and residential address were first obtained from the
individual files of each student maintained by the schools.
Teachers were requested to fill up a short
questionnaire giving their assessment of the child's
ss
performance in (i) different communication skills like
speech, lipreading, reading, writing, use of residual
hearing and amp1.ificd.tion, observa t:ion ability and amount
of spontaneous expression; (ii) academic subjects;
(iii) use of gross and fine motor skills; (iv) socializa
tion with classmates.
The primary sources of data were the mother and
father of the deaf child. The researcher first sent
"t'll.'C'ill 'Q, '<l'll.,fl"\ "in1tfm'Q,~ ~b"i."i.tfI· in"i.'I'tltJ.'QZ.'!.."145 'Mi'!'D~~'i 'O."1,t.
explaining the purpose of the study and the broad areas
on which she wished to interview them. This letter
definitely helped in establishing rapport and preparing
parents for the interview process. 80me parents
immediately sent a letter to the researcher stating
that she was welcome to come home to see them any time.
Some parents approached the teachers for clarification
regarding the letter.
Tools
The main tool used for data collection was the
Interview Schedule. A set of four schedules was
prepared for each family. Data for the first three
schedules was gathered from the mother and for the
fourth schedule from the father.
64
The first schedule contained questions regard
ing the child's particulars which were partly obtained
through the child's school records as mentioned above
and partly through the mother. This schedule was
entirely precoded.
Schedule II was designed to provide background
info rma tion of ~amily t informa t~on on type of
communication skills known to different family members,
participation in Parents' Groups and parent-Teacher
Meetings, mother's knowledge about different aspects of
the handicap, her sources of information for gaining
this knowledge, her knowledge and utilization of
different special services available in the city for
the deaf, her opinion of impact of child's presence on
daily life, her expectations from the child, and
finally her perception of-the child's awareness of the
consequences of his handicap On himself. Many questions
in this schedule were precoded. However, some questions •
like knowledge of the handicap, expectations from child,
knowledge of the s~ecial services were Left Q~en
ended.
65
~chedULe III 'contained questions on the process
of commUnication between mother and deaf child and
her perception of this process between deaf child and
her, child I s father and sibling. The questions were
put in the form of situations based on five purposes
for communicating (mentioned earlier in the section
on scope of the study). The data on frequency of
communication, message encoding skills, message decod
ing skillS, channels used and assessment of outcome
were recorded in codes for each situation. The last
part of this schedULe contained a list of factors
influencing communication from which mother was asked
to identify factors which, according to her, helped the
communication process, those which created problems
and those which had no effect. Lastly, her plans for
coping with the identified problems were probed. lVlost
of the questions were precOded although some questions
like, reason for not communicating in a given situation
and plans i"or coping with identified problems on her
own, were left open-ended.
66
~chedule IV administered to the father provided
information on his knowledge of the handicap, his
sources for gaining this knowledge, his knowledge and
utiliza tion of special services available in the city
for the deaf, his opinion of impact of child's presence
on daily life, his expectations t"rom the chi.ld and. his
perception of child's awareness of the consequences of
his handicap on himself. The second part of the
schedule contained questions on the process of
communication between himself and deaf child. fhe
situations and the method of recording answers were
the same as for the mother. The last part of the
schedule contained the same list of influencing factors
as in sched.~e III followed by similar questions for
the father. Coding procedure also was identical.
A set of flash cards in ~nglish, 6uJarati, Hindi
and Marathi were used for some questions on "Sources
for gaining information about the handicap", "Knowledge
and utilization of special services", "the communication
process" were used "to aid the respondents in answering
the questions posed.
A set of Seven photographs were specially
prepared by the researcher with the co-operation of
67
the Principal and a few mothers of Vikas Yidyalaya
School I'or the Deaf depicting the use of a combination
of encoding skills, decoding skills and channels used
while communicating in a dyad situation. .l:Set'ore
asking questions to the mother and father on the
process of communication, the researcher explained the
use of the combination of encoding skills, decoding
skills and channels with the help of these photographs.
This audio-visual presentation was very helpful in
enabling ~arents to relate the said ~rocess concretely
to their own situations. It provided relief to
parents who often were emotional while giving responses
to questions asked. earlier. 'J'hey thus regained their
composure and the atmosphere was much lighter after
showing the photographs.
1Bta coliection took four full months as the
families were scattered allover tlombay and. its
eastern and western suburbs. Eighty interviews were
conducted by this researcher. For conducting the
remaining 20, the researcher was helped by a trained
social worker. Each parent was met personally oy
the researcher,who conducted the interviews mostly
at home. However, a few of the tathers' interviews
were conducted in the school premises whenever this
arrangement was mutually suitable. On an average,
each family interview took about 3Y2 hours. To
avoid lengthy sittings at one time and to ensure
individual opinions, the interviews of the mothers
and fathers were conducted separately on separate
68
days. ~ometimes the mother's interview was split into
two sessions of 1Y2 hours and one hour respectively
according to mutual convenience. ~ecaU8e of the length
of the interview, as far as pOSSible, parents were
visitea after making a prior appointment through the
parents themselves or through another escort when tney
came to reach the chi~d to 8choo~ or take him home
after school. The school authOrities and teachers were
very helpful in con:t'irming such appointments tor the
researcher.
On the whole, data collection was a very
interesting and enlightening experience. Though the
researcher was given the traditional Indian hospitality
69
in all homes, the t'amilies I reaction to the interview
was expectedly varied, given the nature of the
problems selected for the study. ~ome families
greeted the researcher with an eager enthusiasm to
participate in a t'ruitful session of mutual give,...and
take. Some parents showed great anxiety about
proJecting the "right" image to the researcher. they
sat on the edge of their chair, fidgeted a great deal
and took a long time to answer each question. ~he
researcher's training and experience in social work
practice stood her in good stead in being patient with
them with the result that some of them slowly relaxed
as the interview progressed and as they began to
realize that the researcher was not Judging them or
reprimanding them in any way but was sympathetically
trying to understand the problems they would naturally
face as parent~ of deaf children. Then there were
some p~r~nts who still iookea newildered and hurt by
their child's handicap and received the researcher
with mixed feelings of apathy or suspicion as well as
hopefUlness. Some of the mothers and fathers cried
now and then throughout the interview. ~here were
also a few parents who were cooperative but
completely indifferent to the interview process and
answered questions mechanically as -if the whole
situation was outside themselves. Many parents
expressed their appreciation of the researcher's • concern about their uea!' child and the fact that
someone who they thought W'd.S a .. specialist" was
actually inviting their opinions and asking about
their problems insteaa 01" merely giving out advice
or admonitions.
70
In all,100 mothers were intervi'ewed. However,
only 78 fathers were interviewed, as, 10 fathers were
working abroad, one father was dead, one father had
deserted the family. Eight fathers refused to be
interviewed and two children were under the guardian
ship of their unmarried aunts.
• • "
7. ANALYSIS OF DATA
This section is in two parts.
Construction of Codes and Codebook
Wh~le preparing the oodebooks. the codes in
the Interview Schedules were retained for some items
of information. For other items a different system
of coding was used as described below.
Level of knowledge on two variables were
71
probed, namely, level of knowledge about the handicap
and level of knowledge and utilization of special
services. Coding was done in two stages (i) Responses
on each of the five aspects of the handicap and each
of the eight special services were categorized lndivi~
dually into (a) good knowledge. (b) partial or some
knowledge and (c) hardly any or no knowledge and scored
according to the number of correct responses given.
(ii) In order to arrive at overall Bcores, the Bcores
at stage (i) were summated and categorized again into
(a) good, (b) partial or some and (c) hardly any or no
knowledge.
A similar system of coding was utilized for the
mother's perception of the overall use of the senses
made by the child and teacher's overall assessment
of the child as well as teacher's assessment of
child's communication skills.
Another system of coding was used for
72
"Impact on family of child's presence" and "Factors
infl uencing communication". Here, two-column codes
were used where these in the first column recorded the
number of "No impact" or "no effect" responses. Those
in the second column for "child's impact on daily life",
were based on the difference between the number of
aspects in daily life which were, "better now" and
which were "worse now". Similarly, the codes in the
second column for "Factors influencing communication"
were based on the difference between factors "helpful"
to the. process and factors "creating problems" in the
process. For arriving at the codes for overall impact •
of child on family and overall influence of factors
on communication respectively, codes in the second
column were merged, categorized, and coded using the
five point scale as follows:
Overall imE§!:£t of chil~2 £fesence on family
• (Jodes
1 -. .
Very POSitive impact ,
2 - ~omewhat positive impact
•
3 3 - Neutral impact
~ . •
73
Overall influence of factors on communication
Codes
1 Very helpful
2' - Quite helpful
3 Not much effect
4- - ::Iomewha t nega ti v e .. 4- Create some problems impact
5 - Very negative impact 5 Create many problems
x- NA ·x NA
• As there 'were 17 si tuations·'in which father and
mother communicated with deaf child and 15 situations
where the deaf child communicated'with father, mother • and sibling, coding of ' the process of communication was . done intwd ways. • . .
(i) For each dyad relationship all the situations
were considered together for frequency of . . communica tion, reason for not communicating,
message-encoding' skills, channels, message-
decoding skills and assessment of outcome as
follows:
74
- For overall frequency of communication
the number 0 f 8i tua tions in which communi ca
tion took place (a) always, (b) sometimes
or (c) never, was arrived at and coded
acco rdingly.
From among the variety of reasons cited in
all the situations, the two most frequent
reasons cited for not communicating were
coded.
- For Encoding skills, Channels and Decoding
skills, the frequency of different patterns
in each element was noted separately. The
pattern occuring most frequently in each
element was coded individually as the major
pattern for that element and the pattern
appearing in the remaining situations in each
element were coded individually as the minor
pattern, for thaf element.
- Overall assessment of outcome was arrived at
by counting the number of situations where
the receiver could be considered to have
understood the messages and categorized
accordingly.
(ii) For each dyad group,all the si tuations· for
each purpose for communicating have been
considered together in the same way as
mentioned above. The only difference was
that for the three elements, namely, the
message-encoding skills. channel sand
message-decoding skills, only the major
pattern in each of was coded.
Because of the intricate nature of the subject •
chosen for study and the need to have a set of four
75
schedules, the resulting data required a voluminous code
book conSisting of as many as seven cards. Having a
detailed code-book facilitated the later job of
presenting meaningful analysis of data.
8. tJ!ALYSIS OF DATA
. ",ere-The variables sel ected for analysl.s ~ closely
related to the objectives of the study. To begin with,
the frequency of communication between corresponding
dyad relationships (mother-chiid; child-mother; ,;.l*-~~er
father-child; child-father) with reference to all'
situations taken together and each of the f'ive
purposes were analysed. A similar analysis was done
for reasons for not communicating. The relationship
between frequency of communication and assessment
of outcome for all situations taken together as well
as all situation for each of the purposes for each
76
dyad relationship were examined. The interaction
between the three elements, viz. the combination of
encoding Skills, combination of channels and combina
tion of decoding skills brought forth definite major
CPs. That is to say, that a particular source-receiver
pair used a specific combination of encoding skills,
channels and decoding skills when communicating for a
particular purpose. Th1.ZS different dyad rela tionships
produced different CPs when communicating for different
purposes, These CPs are very important for understand
ing the type and extent of communication taking place
in different dyad relationships.
The frequency of communication and the CPs
used by each dyad pair for all the situations taken
77
together have then been examined in the light of
their relationship to the family's personal characte
ristics and reactions to the child. The major
personal characteristics to which they have been
related are age-group and sex of child, age, educa
tional level of parents, SES of family, hearing
status of family members, parents' level of knowledge
about the handicap and their expectations from child.
The other majo r variables are: perc ei ved
influencing factors, identified problems and ways of
ooping with them. ¥irst, both parents' opinions
about the overall influence of 14 factors on communica
tion have been described followed by a comparison
between mother's and father's opinions. Parents'
perceptions of the overall influence of factors on
communication were then related first to child's age
group and sex, SES of family and their perception of
the, impact on family of child's presence. Next, they
were related to the extent of communication and the
CPs us ed by the Mother-'child and J!'a ther-child dyads.
Five factors were selected for intensive analysis.
78
They were (i) child's use of hearing-aid; (ii) educa
tional level of parent; (iii) parent's level of
knowledge of the handicap; (iv) awareness of specialized
services; and (v) medium of instruction at school with
reference to language spoken at home. Parents'
perceptions of the influence of the above five factors
on communication, if perceived as creating problems,
reasons why they were identified as such, and parents'
plan for coping with identified problems were described.
Parents' perception of the influence of each of the
five factors was next related to, appropriate background
characteristics and the extent of communication initia
ted by mother-child and ~ather-child dyads.
Lastly, parents' ov"erall ability to cope wi tl:J.
identified problems was related to age-group and sex
of child, SES of family and their perception of
impact on family of child's presence. Parents' overall
ability to cope was also related to the extent of
communication and CPs used by mother-child and tather
ehil d dyads.
The data were machine processed. Apart from
presenting frequencies and percentages, x2 test was
applied to see the degree of significance of the
relationship between some of the variables.
79
Recommended