Deaf Adolescents' Comprehension of English Prepositions

The probable sequence of the comprehension of written English prepositions by hearing-impaired adolescents is predicted through the use of Clark's (1973) scheme for predicting the acquisition of prepositions by normal hearing children. Clark predicted the acquisition sequence on the basis of a featural analysis of the semantics of the prepositions and the application of generalized principles of language acquisition. According to this scheme, normal hearing children first acquire locative prepositions, then temporal, and finally manner prepositions. Multiple choice tests of preposition usage were given to 206 severely to profoundly hearing-impaired adolescents. In general, the deaf adolescents followed the predicted sequence but showed a greater ability to comprehend the manner or "grammatical" prepositions than would be expected. Three general principles for preposition comprehension by deaf adolescents are proposed.