Deaf Child Signers’ Reading Behaviors Are Predicted by Their Bilingual (Signed and Spoken) Vocabularies: Evidence from Eye-Tracking

Deaf children who acquire a signed language at home and at school prior to learning to read are a unique group of developing bilinguals. They are first-language users of a signed language (e.g., American Sign Language; ASL) and second-language users of the written form of the ambient spoken language (e.g., English). Because signed languages do not possess orthographies that are widely used, deaf readers typically read in their second language. This profile stands in contrast to hearing bilingual readers, who read in their first language and, sometimes, their second language. In studies of child readers, vocabulary knowledge is a strong predictor of reading comprehension for both monolinguals and bilinguals. We combine the unique linguistic backgrounds of young signing deaf readers with what is known about vocabulary knowledge and reading, guided by the following research question: Does signed (L1) and spoken (L2) vocabulary knowledge predict reading (eye-gaze) behaviors of deaf children when reading in their L2? We present results from an exploratory pilot eye-tracking study of nine deaf ASL-English bilingual children ages 9–11, examining whether ASL and English vocabulary knowledge predict different aspects of the reading paradigm. Results suggest that ASL vocabulary predicts where-decisions and measures of oculomotor control such as skipping and regressions, while English vocabulary predicts when-decisions and first-pass durations. We suggest these results from this small-scale study provide initial support for the language interdependence hypothesis because deaf child signers’ first-language vocabulary knowledge predicts some of the variance in second-language reading performance.