DCAL Advisory Committee meeting 13'9'06

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DCAL Advisory Committee meeting 13.9.06
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Agenda
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The Advisory Committee

• The Research Centre will have an Advisory
  Committee, to advise the Director on the Centres
  general strategy in order to achieve its aims and
  objectives and also to maximise the outreach and
  impact of its research.

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Reports

• Staffing
• Technical
• Associated projects
• Students
• Summer school taster course
• Seminar programme
• Visitors
• Publications

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Introduction
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Introduction

• Advisory Committee membership
• Role of the Advisory Committee
• Structure of DCAL
• The Centre

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Research Presentations
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DCAL Online Participation System

• Crossgroup team
• Kearsy Cormier, Adam Schembri, Tanya Denmark

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Rationale for online system

• Sign language research typically with small,
  manageable numbers of participants
• DCAL projects much larger numbers
• Norming study alone around 100 participants
• One centralised DCAL database for research
  participants
• Ethical and data protection considerations

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Sona Systems

• Web-based participant pool management system for
  universities
• Experiment Management System (Sona Systems, Inc.)
• Typically used by psychology depts (e.g. UCL
  Psychology)
• Allows confidential storage of info and anonymous
  recruitment
• Participants are known to researchers with
  numeric ID code only

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Demos

• Demo as new participant
• Pretest (questionnaire), introduction and first
  few pages
• Demo as researcher
• Setting up study
• Pretest qualification analysis
• Pretest data analysis

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Cross-group Activities Normative Lexical Data
for BSL ( Assessment Tools for BSL)

• Dr Adam Schembri

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Objective

• To develop a thorough description of the lexicon
  and grammar of BSL through
• Collection of normative data
• Assessment tools based on the these data

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Normative Data

• We will collect data about the following
  properties of BSL lexical signs
• Familiarity/rarity of signs
• How familiar are various signs to BSL signers?
• Iconicity
• To what degree do signs resemble what they
  represent?
• Age of acquisition (AoA)
• At what age are various signs acquired?

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Collection of normative data

• We will collect normative data from BSL signers
  around the UK (at least 100 signers) on
  familiarity, iconicity and AoA for 300 BSL signs.
• Signers will rate these different dimensions on a
  7-point scale (will show demo of on-line norming
  task)
• The resulting normative data will be used in
  preparation of materials for testing by
  research groups within DCAL.

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Target groups for norming

• All adult signers, aged 18-60
• native signers who learnt BSL from Deaf parents
• early signers (e.g., first exposed to BSL aged
  3-5 years)
• mid-childhood signers (e.g., first exposed to BSL
  ages 9-11 years)
• late signers (e.g., exposed to BSL after age 15)

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Norming data What for?

• Will be used by researchers within DCAL and
  associated projects
• Language processing group (iconicity,
  familiarity, AoA)
• Language development group (AoA)
• Will be used in development of assessment tools
  for BSL

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Sign language assessment

• Very few tools for assessing sign language
  competence
• There are no normed assessments of BSL for adults
  (some for children)
• Difficult to judge what the norm should be
• Importance of knowing when signer learned to sign
• Native signers Only 5-10 of D/deaf population
• Research on other sign languages has clearly
  shown that varied age of exposure to a sign
  language affects fluency.

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Development of standardised assessment tool

• We will create a computer-based BSL assessment
  tool for comprehension of
• Phonology
• Vocabulary
• Syntax morphology
• Also a computerised production test
• Sentence repetition task

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Use of normative data in assessments

• Target signs in assessment tasks will be balanced
  for familiarity wherever possible
• Importance of including signs very low in
  familiarity
• Normative data on iconicity and AoA may also be
  used in developing assessment tools

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Implications and applications

• These tools will provide a benchmark for BSL
  competence
• Within DCAL
• These normative data and assessment tools will be
  used in most of the 5 research strands within
  DCAL

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Beyond DCAL

• The data tools will also be made available to
  other BSL researchers across the country.
• Will aid in understanding the causes of
  differences between deaf individuals
• Useful in designing intervention programmes to
  promote better communication and learning in
  various populations
• Pupils of secondary school age
• Deaf children and adults with developmental or
  acquired communication impairments
• First steps to establishing sign therapy

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Current status

• Norming study
• Piloting the set of signs to be normed
• Ensuring the norming task works for use as an
  online task (will also offer an offline version -
  DVD and rating sheets)
• Scheduled to begin late September 2006
• Assessment tools
• Researching other assessment tools that are
  available
• Deciding on target linguistic structures to
  assess
• Deciding on methods, types of task to be used in
  assessment
• Scheduled for completion late 2007

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BSL MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development
Inventory
Tyron Woolfe
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Current situation in UK

• British Sign Language evidence but from 3yr.
  onwards
• There is no evidence base for under 3yr.
• Parents are therefore subject to worry

• Audiological evidence
• Speech evidence
• Convincing
• Reassuring

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The BSL MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development
Inventory (CDI)

• What it does
• What it does not do
• Developing a BSL version
• Preliminary findings
• Advantages and Disadvantages
• Current areas of interest

http//www.sci.sdsu.edu/cdi/cdiwelcome.htm
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• What it does
• Gives an indication as to the average vocabulary
  size that ought to be attained by an age group.
• Allows monitoring to be objective
• Alerts for indicators of delays/language related
  disabilities

• What it does not do
• Give a definite number of vocabulary
• Give any insight into morphology
• Give a comprehensive picture of a childs
  communicative abilities - index

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Scientific Properties of the MacArthur-Bates CDI

• extremely reliable, r.96
• High validity scores (.60 - .80)
• Has been translated into numerous languages, e.g.
  French, Cantonese, Spanish, Russian and ASL

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Anderson Reilly 2002ASL MacArthur-Bates CDI

• 69 deaf children
• 34 longitudinal
• Modified from English CDI
• Reliability r.91
• Validity .87

• Variation in vocabulary size
• 6 vocabulary size groups rather than age groups
  for analysis
• Nouns, Predicates and Closed Class items

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The BSL MacArthur-Bates CDI

• Development of this tool
• Where it fits in with the Positive Support
  Project www.positivesupport.info

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Research sample to date

• 68 children recruited.
• 270 data sets received to date. Hope to have 430
  sets by end of project.
• Age range 636 months.
• 35 hearing children of Deaf parents
• 33 deaf children of Deaf parents
• 36.8 1st generation hearing children to deaf
  parents
• 22 2nd generation deaf children to deaf parents
• 23.5 deaf with more than 2 generations deaf
• 34 male, 34 female
• To date 6 partial data collection dates to
  report this is a 3 yr project with tri-monthly
  data collated at varying dates as per date of
  recruitment.

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Do you know babies/kids who are deaf
aged 3yr
or under with Deaf
parents who use BSL?
www.ucl.ac.uk/HCS/research/EBSLD
Tyron Woolfe, BSc (Hon.), PhD Postdoctoral
Research Assistant Deafness, Communication and
Language University College London 49 Gordon
Square, London WC1H OPD t.woolfe_at_ucl.ac.uk or
sms 07870559242
If yes please contact us
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Recruitment

• Deaf-UK e-groups
• Friends
• Schools
• Deaf websites
• Family contacts
• Recruitment through participants contacts

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Distribution of children aged under 3yr., with
Deaf parents using BSL, in the study
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Comprehension and Production, monthly bands, N256
Receptive Productive
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Comprehension and Production, 3-month bands,
N256
Receptive Productive
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Percentile Scores for Production (N226)
Percentiles
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Percentile Scores for Comprehension (N226)
Percentiles
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Properties of the BSL MacArthur-Bates CDI

• Reliability
• r.95 (productive)
• r.86 (receptive)
• Validity
• r.96 (productive)
• r.89 (receptive)

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Advantages and Disadvantages of developing the
BSL CDI

• Easy to monitor
• Encourages parent-control
• A useful tool for early assessment and
  intervention planning
• Widely known
• Informally seen as a curriculum by some parents

• Limited application for BSL
• Lacks other relevant factors e.g. imitation,
  morphological awareness
• Standardisation difficult to achieve
• English biased parents
• Small group size difficult for statistical
  research
• Validation

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Areas of interest in relation to CDI data as
per Anderson Reilly paper as well as other
interests

• Hearing Status
• Theoretical Hearing children as Bimodal and
  Bilingual
• Gender
• Parental education
• Parental occupation
• Attitude of signing

• Generations of deaf people in the family
• Nominalization, Predicates, and closed class
  items
• Vocabulary size

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Hearing Status
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Gender
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Acknowledgements

• Professor Margaret Harris initial adaptation
  from ASL MacArthur-Bates CDI
• This project is a collaboration between the
  University of Manchester and University College
  London, in partnership with Deafness Research UK
  (the Hearing Research Trust) and the National
  Deaf Children's Society. The project is funded by
  the National Lottery through the Big Lottery
  Fund.

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Directors Report
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Directors Report

• Outcomes to date and research plans for 2007
• Cross-group strand
• Language development
• Atypical language
• Face to face communication
• Language processing
• The individual and the community

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Face to face communicationRuth Campbell

• Studies of speechreading and face actions in sign
  language

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Two aspects

• Developing a test of child speechreading
• with Tara Mohammed and Mairead MacSweeney
• Experimental studies of face processing in sign
  language - to start in 2007. Possible additional
  collaborators - Olivier Pascalis, Sheffield
  University, John Swettenham, UCL, Brad Duchaine,
  UCL

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Developing a test of childrens speechreading -
TOCS

• to assess silent spoken English comprehension in
  deaf and hearing children aged 6 12
• to inform and extend the language profile of
  children, using a deaf-friendly task and to
  determine the factors that are affected by and
  affect speechreading (literacy? communication?)
• to inform clinical intervention with children,
  especially where speechreading is a necessary
  skill (CI children)

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Where we are

• Dr Fiona Kyle appointed April 2006 (2 years)
• work to be done in collaboration with schools
  and special units
• collaboration with SLPTs in London region
  meetings held
• ethical and CRB clearance gained for the project

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What we are doing

• Two strand approach
• a basic psycholinguistic test of speechreading,
  comprising single words, short sentences and two
  or more linked phrases, with some add ons
  (minimal pair (pat and hat) and prosody
  (question/ statement/ lexical stress)
• a clinical test for use with SLPTS using
  communication-relevant speech (what is your
  name? point to your toe)

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format

• Computer-based display, with natural videoclips
• Choose picture to match word
• Software developed in-house.. Displays and
  collects speed and accuracy data for every item
• Developed from previous test for adults

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Schedule

• Identify items for test (about 80 utterances per
  model two models used), and agree on additional
  tests May-July 06 v
• Record test models (audiovisual)
• July August 06 v
• Edit test items into presentation software
  August September 06 - ongoing
• Identify respondents and liaise with schools
  August September 06 - ongoing
• Test in schools and at DCAL October December 06

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Other activities

• Workshop 14-16th November 2006
• Advances in Speechreading Research, with
  invited guest speakers, postgraduate student
  presentations
• Ongoing meetings with SLPTs (SALTIBAD)
• links with IDB work on speech and sign
  processing in deaf brains presentations and
  paper submissions

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Management

• Staffing report
• Technical report
• Associated projects

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Capacity building
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Capacity building and the research
environment

• Research students
• Staff and student training
• Summer school
• Taster course
• Seminars
• Visitors
• Mary Brennan Fellowship
• Library

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Dissemination and engagement
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Dissemination and engagement

• Communications
• Publications

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DCAL communications
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DCAL communications plan (CP)
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Overall objective of project
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To obtain participants for research
Communications Plan Objectives

• To indicate progress and success to grant managers

To communicate findings of research to Academic
World
To seed possible applications of findings
To reach policy makers
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Communications tools
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Comms Budget 160k
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Create initial Awareness
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DCAL Opening Event Invitations
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• DCAL Opening Ceremony

Lots of pictures plus press pack on the website
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DCAL WEBSITE
www.dcal.ucl.ac.uk
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DCAL LOGO
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DCAL Roadshow
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DCAL Comms Activity

• Autumn Press Release Featuring Research Findings
• A sponsored Arts Project such as Deaf Haiku
• Deaf Sculpture in the Gardens

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Forward look

• 1.Defining the field
• The academic world
• Research and society
• 2. The direction of research
• Where are the core disciplines going?
• Can DCAL affect the agenda?
• 3. Cross-disciplinarity and the future