On the Cognitive Ability of Deaf Children with Deaf Parents

This article is concerned with the alleged above-average IQ of deaf children with deaf parents. Data are reported which show that when the cognitive ability of such children is compared with that of genetically deaf children with hearing parents, no difference is evident. Since (a) deaf children free of additional handicaps are known to have a mean IQ of 100 and (b) no useful hypothesis has yet been proposed to account for the superior IQ of deaf children with deaf parents, we suggest that the supporting data are faulty.