No abstract

Selecting an initial sign lexicon for an individual requires far more than simply making a list of useful words or translating a spoken lexicon into signs through use of a sign dictionary. It requires knowledge of child language acquisition, knowledge of manual signs and linguistic constraints on their use, and knowledge of the needs and desires of the individual for whom the lexicon is intended. Suggestions of writers such as Holland (1975) and Lahey and Bloom (1977) are studied in terms of their appropriateness for visual-manual communication and are applied to approximately 50 signs most frequently taught to retarded and autistic persons (Fristoe and Lloyd, 1979a) to aid in lexicon planning. Additional signs are proposed for extending this basic list. The resulting sample lexicon is evaluated against the suggestions of Holland and of Lahey and Bloom. Rationales given for determining these selections, deletions, and additions can be applied to modify this initial lexicon to make it better suited for a specific individual.

Blissymbols and manual signs are two representational systems widely used as alternatives to spoken communication for persons unable to speak understandably. They were compared to determine if there is any advantage of one over the other in ease of learning or in retention. Immediate and 1-day posttest measures were obtained from 20 7- and 8-year-old children engaged in a paired-associate transfer-of-training task using manual signs and Blissymbols. Results showed no overall difference between signs and symbols in number of correct responses on either the immediate or 1-day posttest.

This study focuses on the controversial issue of the integrity of gestural communication abilities in subjects with aphasia. To define the ability of subjects to interpret symbolic gestures, an Amer-Ind Recognition Test (ART) was developed which required no verbal response from the examiner or the subject. The relationships between impairment of Amer-Ind signal recognition and (a) severity of aphasia, (b) listening and talking abilities and (c) the type of response picture used were investigated. Whether subjects more often chose related foils than unrelated foils in a forced-choice format was also examined. Two training tests and the ART are described. Results from administration to 15 aphasic subjects indicated that: (a) all subjects performed equally well, regardless of their aphasia severity classification; (b) action picture recognition was related to listening ability; (c) action pictures were easier to identify than object pictures; and (d) on error responses, subjects overwhelmingly chose related over unrelated foils. The possibility that gestural abilities were relatively well preserved among the subjects tested, in the presence of a wide range of listening and talking deficits, is also discussed.

The present investigation studied the effects of enhancements on the learning, retention, transfer to the unlearned form, and use of Blissymbols in 40 normal 3-year-old children. The subjects, seen individually, learned either 12 standard Blissymbols (SBS) or the same 12 symbols in the enhanced form (EBS). The symbols were introduced with short explanations. The number of trials taken to reach >90% correct identification, the number of symbols selected appropriately to complete a communicative act, the number of symbols correctly identified a week after the acquisition phase was completed, and the number of symbols correctly identified in the untrained form of Blissymbols were determined. The results demonstrated that the subjects learned EBS faster than SBS, remembered more EBS than SBS in the retention task, did not differ in the communicative use of SBS and EBS, and were affected more negatively when presented with SBS than EBS in a task where the untrained form was presented. The results are discussed in terms of how very young children might benefit more from an illustration system such as EBS than from an orthographic system such as SBS.