Sign iconicity and receptive vocabulary testing

Area of Science:

• Psycholinguistics
• Educational Psychology
• Deaf Studies

Background:

• Developing valid receptive sign vocabulary tests is crucial for assessing language acquisition in deaf individuals.
• The influence of sign iconicity, the visual resemblance between a sign and its referent, on test performance requires further investigation.
• Existing vocabulary tests may not be suitable for deaf signers due to potential iconicity biases.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the development of valid receptive sign vocabulary tests.
• To examine the impact of sign iconicity on test performance in both deaf and hearing participants.
• To provide recommendations for creating more accurate sign vocabulary assessments.

Main Methods:

• Adapted 40 items from the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Revised (PPVT-R).
• Developed three distractor items per target item to mitigate perceptual matching strategies in nonsigning participants.
• Administered tests to 34 deaf signing undergraduates and 36 hearing nonsigning undergraduates.

Main Results:

• Deaf students significantly outperformed hearing students on both original and manipulated sign vocabulary items.
• Hearing students scored higher on original items than manipulated items, suggesting inherent iconicity.
• Both groups exceeded chance levels, indicating that many items possessed some degree of iconicity.

Conclusions:

• Sign iconicity can influence vocabulary test performance, even in sophisticated participants.
• Complete elimination of iconicity in sign tests is challenging.
• Involving nonsigning hearing participants in test development can help reduce iconicity effects and improve validity for deaf signers.