Assessing Impact of Early Intervention Outcomes to Document EHDI Impact in Wisconsin

Anne B. Harris, PhD, University of Wisconsin (Funded 2015-2017)

Approximately one to three out of every 1,000 children in the United States are born deaf or hard of hearing. Over  the past 20 years, research has consistently shown that children who have been identified earlier and enrolled in early intervention have demonstrated better expressive and receptive language and pragmatic skills. A large research study looking at outcomes of participation in early intervention, the National Early Childhood Assessment Project (NECAP), has contributed to the current understanding of the benefit of this approach; but these results need to be replicated by other researchers in different parts of the country. The Wisconsin EHDI program has been a participant in the NECAP study, and, since 2009, has also been collecting additional data on social/emotional development in a research protocol called “Assessment of Early Intervention Outcomes” (AEIOu). This revised AEIOu/EHDI Outcomes proposal is designed to expand the scope and capacity of the AEIOu study in Wisconsin in order to provide corroborating data and documentation of the EHDI program on enrollment and developmental outcomes for children receiving Early Intervention services.  Specific Objectives are:

1. To assess the impact of receiving early intervention services on developmental outcomes as measured in the AEIOu study (expressive and receptive language, functional listening, social-emotional development, reading readiness at school entry) for children who are deaf and hard of hearing, controlling for covariates including race/ethnicity, maternal education, age at identification, degree of hearing loss, birth history, co-occurring conditions, type and intensity of intervention.
2. To compare two models for EHDI collaboration with Part C Early Intervention on age of enrollment and developmental outcomes as measured by AEIOu for children who are deaf and hard of hearing in Wisconsin in the years 2015-2017.