Doctoral Dissertation Research: The development of numerical cognition and linguistic number use: Insights from sign languages

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Early language deprivation too often characterizes the circumstances of deaf children born in hearing families with little access to language in any form, spoken or signed. Language deprivation has long lasting negative effects on cognitive, educational and life outcomes. The goal of our project is to study the effects of language deprivation on the acquisition of numeracy and linguistic number use in sign language: an understudied and important topic. Our research can potentially enrich theoretical understanding of the relationship between language and number. The practical implication of the research is to provide specialists in deaf education with more information on the strengths and weaknesses of number cognition in students who are deaf and experience language at a late age. In the four studies of this dissertation, quantification through sign language in native (L1) signers of American Sign Language (ASL) is compared to that of late first-language learners (LL1), congenitally deaf individuals who had no access to natural sign in early life. In the first two studies, we investigate the factors that may influence number acquisition in signers: the potential complexity of (modality-specific) number marking in sign languages and the interaction between number systems and simultaneous morphology (rather than sequential morphology). Study 1 investigates iconicity and the structural properties of number systems of world’s sign languages. Study 2 investigates the interaction of iconic numeral system and morpho-phonological constraints in plural marking in ASL. Study 3 looks at the automatic processing of number expressed both linguistically (ASL signs) and in conventional mathematic symbols (Arabic digits) using the Number Stroop Test paradigm. Study 4 investigates the production and comprehension of selected simultaneous, morphological constructions used in ASL (that mark exact and non-exact plural) in selected classifier constructions by L1 and LL1 learners in comparison to overt number marking through numerals.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.