Early Language Acquisition with Sensory Impairment (ELASI)
Your child may be eligible for a research study at Harvard University with the Bergelson Lab! We study how infants learn words from the world around them and we’re looking for families with 6-30 month-old blind, Deaf, and DeafBlind infants for a research study called Early Language Acquisition with Sensory Impairment (ELASI).
The purpose of this study is to look at early language skills and home learning environments of children with hearing and/or vision impairments, and typically developing peers.
The study involves online surveys about the child’s vision history and language development. You may also complete a home audio recording of the child’s language environment, or, if you are local to Boston, a play session in our Lab! These are completely optional.
For the home recording: Your child will be given a vest to wear and a small, child-safe audio recording device to put inside the vest pocket. You will turn on the recorder when your child wakes up on the day of the recording, and leave the vest and recorder on for the whole day. The recorder can be left on for naps or placed beside the child’s bed while they are sleeping. After recording one day (16 hours), the recorder will automatically turn itself off. The recorder and vest can be returned to the Bergelson Lab either with a prepaid envelope in the mail, staff member pickup, or the lab can arrange for you to drop it off at Harvard.
For the play session: You and your child will be invited to the Bergelson Lab on Harvard’s Campus for an hour-long visit centered around a 30 minute play session. Researchers will record a video of you and your child playing with toys in the lab.
There is also an option to participate only in survey data collection, and not in the home recording session or lab visit.
You will be compensated $55 for participation in the home recording session and completion of surveys and/or $40 for the play session and surveys. Your child will receive a small gift such as a book, t-shirt, or toy to commemorate their participation.
If you choose to only complete the survey portion of this research study, you will be compensated $20.
If this sounds like something you would be interested in, please contact the Bergelson Lab at bergelsonlab@fas.harvard.edu!