*This is the Wiki Page for the DEV Grant Project.*
**DEV Full Title:** Development of Temporal Visual Selective Attention in Deaf Children
**Lab:** Deaf X Lab, NTID Sensory, Perceptual and Cognitive Ecology (SPaCE) Center
**Institution:** National Technical Institute for the Deaf, Rochester Institute of Technology (NTID/RIT)
**PI:** Dr. Matthew Dye
**Co-PI:** Dr. Peter Hauser
**Research Associate:** Brennan Terhune-Cotter, B.S.
**Funding:** National Science Foundation Award #1550988
**Abstract:** Deafness is associated with changes in visual functions and presents a primary example of cross-modal plasticity – changes in one sensory system bringing about changes in another. Studies of visual functions in deaf adults have indicated changes in the spatial distribution of visual attention realized as an enhanced ability to localize objects and detect motion in the visual periphery. The neural signature of the effect is elevated recruitment of multisensory (and possible auditory) cortex in the right cerebral hemisphere. Studies of visual functions in deaf children, on the other hand, have primarily focused on temporal aspects of attention looking at how well the child can shift attention across objects appearing at the same location, not at how the child allocates attention over space. The ability to attend to such a stream of objects and to “pull out” a target object for more processing is referred to here as temporal visual selective attention. Studies of temporal visual selective attention in deaf children have often reported deficits that have been interpreted theoretically as reflecting a role for audition in shaping domain-general temporal processing abilities. However, these studies have focused upon deaf children who often have language delays due to an inability to hear the salient sound structures of spoken language and a lack of access to a natural signed language such as American Sign Language (ASL).
The first goal of the research proposed here is extend our recent cross-sectional work showing typical temporal visual selective attention in deaf children exposed to ASL from birth. Very few deaf children are born into deaf families, so here we will determine the developmental trajectory of temporal visual selective attention in a more heterogeneous sample of deaf children who use American Sign Language as a primary means of communication. This population possesses significant variability in age of exposure to ASL and concomitant proficiency. Using a four-wave accelerated longitudinal design, cohorts of deaf children will be followed over a period of three years. The second goal of this research is to test competing hypotheses that explain alterations in the development of temporal visual selective attention as either an effect of hearing loss or an effect of delayed language exposure.
The specific research aims of this proposal are therefore:
(1) Determine the developmental trajectories of temporal visual selective attention across the early school-age years in deaf children who use ASL as a primary means of communication;
(2) Test competing hypotheses concerning how atypical development of temporal visual selective attention in deaf children is moderated by early language exposure and hearing loss.
The intellectual merit of this proposal derives from an approach that explores the interaction between language and cognitive development across the early school years. This is done by exploiting the inherent variability in natural language exposure and hearing loss that exists in deaf children educated in residential schools for the deaf. A four-wave longitudinal panel design will allow developmental trajectories that span nine years to be collected in just three years.
