Captions and Reading Rates of Hearing-Impaired Students

Reading rate is one of several attributes of reading having a bearing on how effectively and efficiently one reads. With the proliferation of captioned films and the tremendous undertaking of captioning television programs, reading rate becomes a critical issue. By adapting the scoring procedure of the Gates McGinitie Reading Test, speed and accuracy portion, the reading rates of 185 randomly selected hearing-impaired students from residential schools for the deaf were obtained. These rates were then compared with the reading rates of hearing students and extempore speech. Based on the findings, a large number of hearing-impaired students would appear unlikely to benefit from captions.