A Phenomenological Exploration of Academically Gifted Individuals Who Are Deaf or Hard of Hearing
Abstract
:1. Introduction
1.1. Definitions
1.2. Identification and Assessment of Gifted Students
1.3. Cognitive and Affective Factors Influencing Academic Giftedness in the Context of Hearing Impairment
1.4. Educational Accommodations and Support
2. Method
- How do these individuals navigate their dual identities of being academically gifted and Deaf/hard of hearing?
- What challenges and supports do these individuals encounter in their academic and personal lives?
- How do factors such as family support, educational accommodations, and self-advocacy skills influence the experiences of these individuals?
- What strategies do these individuals employ to overcome communication barriers and achieve academic success?
- How does the intersection of giftedness and hearing loss affect social interactions and relationships for these individuals?
- What commonalities and differences exist in the experiences of academically gifted individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing?
2.1. Participants
2.2. Data Collection Procedure
- What do you wish that teachers, parents, peers, friends, and/or school administrators knew about you?
- What do you wish they knew about hard-of-hearing people in general?
- What could have helped you in your classes?
- Are there specific strategies, accommodations, or support systems that would have made a difference?
- How much do you believe that teachers matter in how well hard-of-hearing students perform in the classroom?
2.3. Data Analysis
2.4. Positionality and Rigor
3. Results and Discussion
3.1. Participant Overview
3.2. Shared Experiences
3.2.1. Empathy and Compassion
I especially like being a tutor because it kind of, I don’t know, being the person on the receiving end of kind of needing to be helped. I felt like I really understood what it meant to kind of like, I don’t really know how to explain it, but like I had been on the receiving end of a lot of help. So I knew what it was like to need help and I was able to kind of adapt to my circumstances and use a lot of different teaching methods.
I want to be an audiologist. I would always tell people like if you’ve seen those videos of kids like hearing something for the first time that they didn’t hear before, like I was that kid. So, I want to be that person that helps someone like that.
3.2.2. Academic Resilience
It was extremely difficult, and I just felt so terrible that I was letting my parents down. So basically, I wanted to end up where my parents could be proud of me. That was really my sole motivation. And in turn, I was able to be proud of myself once again.
So, being hard of hearing in school was definitely always difficult. I remember when I was younger [in] elementary school, I would have a lot of difficulty hearing what my teacher was saying, which caused me to fall behind in a few of my classes until I really confronted [it] because at first, I didn’t really know. I thought this was the same level of hearing that everyone else was experiencing until I talked to my teacher about it and was like I really can’t hear much of what you’re saying.
Originally, I started looking at grad school, I was just interested in taking a few classes in media… I filled out the application and had to take a test to prove that I could do it. I hadn’t done great in English [before] so I was amazed that I didn’t have to take remedial English. I did good. Somewhere [during] meeting with [the advisor] and talking, I thought I’m just going to go further.
3.2.3. Identity Navigation
3.2.4. Supportive Environments
3.2.5. Self-Advocacy Development
3.2.6. Reframing Twice-Exceptionality as a Unique Advantage
3.3. Divergences in Experiences
3.3.1. Cultural Identification
I grew up in mainstream schools. All the Deaf kids in the county go to the same elementary, middle, and high schools because of the lack of d/hh teachers and interpreters in their area, even if it is two hours away by bus drive. So, I get a lot of support from d/hh teachers and interpreters in this way because there are so few of us Deaf that they have enough time to teach us.
I feel like I lived two different lives, like in school. I mean, well, yeah. In school it was all English. I didn’t really see people that were like me, like that were Hispanic. And then at home there was, like everything’s in Spanish like I live with my family, I would. We all had family and friends that were Hispanic, so in my, like in school thinking back to my younger school age, like, I feel like, I felt like I lived two different lives, you know?
3.3.2. Educational Support
…I think that if I would have received more individualized attention in smaller classes, or in after school, like teacher student help or things like that, where you know if it would have been done at all, but also if it would have been done in a positive fashion. I think I would have benefited greatly from that”.
3.3.3. Self-Perception
3.4. Unique Perspectives
3.4.1. Faith-Based Resilience
3.4.2. Intersectionality of Identity
…I was the only Hispanic person. I feel like maybe that’s why because they were like, oh, well, there’s never really someone that’s not White in these types of classes getting these types of grades. I feel like when I went into college, and now in the university, we’re a lot more diverse than I remember in elementary and middle school. I felt different, you know, and I would always compare myself to my classmates.
3.4.3. Professional Adaptation
3.4.4. Artistic Pursuits
4. Conclusions
4.1. Limitations
4.2. Practical Implications
4.3. Future Directions
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Conflicts of Interest
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Name a | Age | Gender | Ethnicity | Gifted Identification | Hard of Hearing | Communication Method | Personal History |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Julia | 21 | Female | White | High academic achievement | Moderate to severe sensorineural hearing loss | Spoken language | Benefited from strong financial resources, a close relationship with her mother, and educational support including an IEP. Despite facing bullying and social challenges, she remains determined to succeed in her chosen field. |
Gabby | 22 | Female | Hispanic | Per Georgia State guidelines | Hard of Hearing | Spoken language | Comes from a low-income immigrant family and excels in self-advocacy. |
Jake | 25 | Male | White | High academic achievement | Deaf | American Sign Language | His strong faith and self-acceptance have helped shape his academic journey and advocacy work. |
Haley | 24 | Female | White | Per Georgia State guidelines | Deaf | Spoken language/American Sign Language | She is bilingual in English and ASL and shows strong creative abilities. |
Lily | 28 | Female | Hispanic | Demonstrated high academic achievement and creative ability | Hard of Hearing | Spoken language | She is a trained opera singer and speaks three languages, and she has overcome significant health challenges while pursuing her educational goals. |
Mark | 67 | Male | White | High IQ | Hard of Hearing | Spoken language | He is academically driven, holding a double major with a 3.9 GPA, and particularly excels in art. Mark’s resilience and determination have helped him navigate challenges, including limited family support. |
Christina | 56 | Female | White | High IQ | Hard of Hearing | Spoken language | Faced financial barriers to higher education. Despite early academic success, she experienced challenges in high school due to progressive hearing loss. |
Maria | 85 | Female | White | Participated in AP programming and identified as gifted by teachers. | Hard of Hearing | Spoken language | Experienced financial barriers to education. Comes from an Italian immigrant family and had to translate for her low-income family at a young age. She uses hearing aids and lip reading to communicate. |
Timothy | 22 | Male | White | Participated in AP programming and Honors College | Hard of Hearing | Spoken language | Excelled in STEM subjects, particularly chemistry, during his academic career. Despite facing challenges in hearing, he was a member of his high school’s honor society, received various academic awards, and went on to major in chemistry in college. |
Isabella | 57 | Female | White (Italian) | Graduated with Honors | Hard of Hearing | Spoken language | Experienced sudden unilateral hearing loss at age 39 but maintained a successful academic career as a university professor. |
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Desmet, O.A.; Ippolito, S.; Herren, J.; Guzman-Roman, S. A Phenomenological Exploration of Academically Gifted Individuals Who Are Deaf or Hard of Hearing. Educ. Sci. 2025, 15, 530. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci15050530
Desmet OA, Ippolito S, Herren J, Guzman-Roman S. A Phenomenological Exploration of Academically Gifted Individuals Who Are Deaf or Hard of Hearing. Education Sciences. 2025; 15(5):530. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci15050530
Chicago/Turabian StyleDesmet, Ophélie Allyssa, Sofia Ippolito, Jenna Herren, and Sophia Guzman-Roman. 2025. "A Phenomenological Exploration of Academically Gifted Individuals Who Are Deaf or Hard of Hearing" Education Sciences 15, no. 5: 530. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci15050530
APA StyleDesmet, O. A., Ippolito, S., Herren, J., & Guzman-Roman, S. (2025). A Phenomenological Exploration of Academically Gifted Individuals Who Are Deaf or Hard of Hearing. Education Sciences, 15(5), 530. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci15050530