LONGITUDINAL-STUDY OF FM SYSTEM USE IN NONACADEMIC SETTINGS - EFFECTSON LANGUAGE-DEVELOPMENT

Objective: The overall objective of the present study was to assess th e efficacy of FM system use in the home setting for a group of prescho ol children with mild-to-severe sensorineural hearing loss. Changes in language acquisition were monitored and compared with similar measure s from a group of children who used hearing aids. Secondarily, the per ceived benefits and practical problems associated with FM system use a cross a variety of nonacademic situations were documented. Design: Ten children with mild-to-severe sensorineural hearing loss participated in a 2-yr longitudinal study investigating the efficacy of FM system u se in the home setting. The subjects were divided into two groups: one group was instructed to use FM systems at home as often as possible w hile the other used only their personal hearing aids. Changes in langu age acquisition were monitored in both groups. Subjective benefit and the practical problems associated with use of FM systems outside of tr aditional academic environments were monitored via daily use logs, a w eekly observation inventory, and a situation listening profile. Result s: The majority of children in both groups improved in all measures of language development over the study interval. Although there were rel atively large individual differences in performance for some measures, no statistically significant differences between the FM and hearing a id users were found. However, some children in the FM group made unusu ally large gains in some aspects of language development over the stud y interval. In addition, both parents and children reported benefits o f FM system use in specific listening situations. Throughout the 2-yr study, a number of practical problems associated with FM system use ou tside the classroom were identified. Conclusions: Formal language meas ures did not yield significant differences between the FM and HA group s, but some subjects had rates of language acquisition which suggested that FM system use may be beneficial in selected cases. In addition, subjective reports of FM system benefit suggest that appropriate use o f the device may facilitate effective communication in a variety of li stening situations. Although recent advances in FM system design may m inimize some of the factors that reportedly restricted consistent FM: use in this study, the complexities associated with the modes of opera tion and problems with FM interference remain issues that require cons istent audiologic monitoring of FM system use in nonacademic environme nts.