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How Many People Use ASL in the United States? Why Estimates Need Updating
Abstract
This article traces the sources of the estimates of the number of American Sign Language users in the United States. A variety of claims can be found in the literature and on the Internet, some of which have been shown to be unfounded but continue to be cited. In our search for the sources of the various (mis)understandings, we have found that all of the data-based estimates of the number of people who use ASL in the United States have their origin in a single study published in the early 1970s, which inquired about signing in general and not ASL use in particular. There has been neither subsequent research to update these estimates nor any specific study of ASL use. The article concludes with a call to action to rectify this problem.
... Estimates of the number of persons in the USA who use sign language have lacked measures for decades (Mitchell, Young, Bachleda, & Karchmer, 2006;Schein & Delk Jr., 1974). Recently, the National Health Interview Survey (NHIS) made possible a crude estimate of sign language use (not necessarily American Sign Language [ASL]) among adults in the USA. ...
... However, their inquiry was limited to deaf (and certainly some hard-of-hearing) persons and did not include signing among hearing persons. To understand claims made about the prevalence of ASL users in the USA, Mitchell et al. (2006) revisited Schein and Delk while drawing upon other research to provide a reasoned guess at the total signing population in 1972. They calculated there were likely between 250,000 and 375,000 "prevocationally deaf" (see Schein & Delk Jr., 1974, p. 2) signers and 500,000 to 642,000 signers generally. ...
... Age-related hearing loss masked the fact that the fraction with moderate trouble hearing was also more likely to be signers. Taking signers at the three lowest hearing acuity levels as roughly comparable to who might have been "prevocationally deaf" in 1972-for the sake of extrapolation and order of magnitude comparison only-we multiplied the Mitchell et al. (2006) estimates by 240/139 (adult population in 2014 over that in 1972; see U.S. Bureau of the Census, 1973, p. xiii) and projected between 432,000 and 647,000 signers, which straddles our 522,000 estimate (see Table 2). If our overall sign language use estimate provides only the order of magnitude for those who use such a non-English language at home-i.e., about 1 million (extrapolating from Mitchell et al. (2006), between 863,000 and 1,108,000)-sign language use would have ranked among the top 10 (between Arabic and Korean; see 2009-2013 ACS estimates in U.S. Census Bureau, 2015). ...
An empirical estimate of how many deaf and hard-of-hearing persons use sign language in the USA was obtained a half-century ago, but no study has measured how many people sign regardless of deafness. This study estimated the number of deaf, hard-of-hearing, and hearing adult signers. Concatenation of the 2010-2018 National Health Interview Surveys was required to provide sufficient sample size. Unadjusted and age-by-sex-adjusted sign language use prevalence across the range of hearing acuity was estimated. Adult sign language use was substantial (2.80%), with its rate of use greater for women than men and younger adults than older adults. As a group, deaf respondents had a far higher rate of sign language use than any other hearing acuity group. This study provides the first empirical estimate of adult sign language use generally, and the first update of any sign language use estimate in a half-century.
... At least 500,000 people in the United States are deaf and use American Sign Language. 1 Compared to individuals from the general population, deaf sign language users are at greater risk for chronic health problems and experience significant health disparities. [2][3][4][5][6] These disparities are driven by systemic inequities within our healthcare system, such as lack of health materials available in sign language and small number of medical professionals who can competently provide deaf patient-centered care. ...
... Most clinical trial researcher respondents indicated that they would need substantial support to identify and obtain interpreters for the informed consent process, as well as to improve the accessibility of their recruitment materials. This forethought should include, at a minimum during grant development stages: (1) developing an adequate budget to support hiring deaf co-investigators in addition to interpreters or obtaining other access accommodations throughout the various stages of the clinical trial; (2) identifying local interpreting agencies for hiring interpreters; (3) training study team members on how to effectively and respectfully interact with deaf people, both in person and via telephone relay services; and, (4) building flexibility into the research protocol to allow for the successful implementation of accommodations (e.g. lengthening the duration of the informed consent session to allow sufficient time for research staff to elaborate on each section of the informed consent form, to use the teachback method, and to permit interpreter clarifications). ...
Background/aims:
This article discusses the barriers that prevent deaf people from participating in clinical trials and offers recommendations to overcome these barriers and ensure equal access to study participation.
Methods:
Between April and May 2022, we conducted six focus groups with 20 deaf adults who use American Sign Language, all of whom had previous experience as research study participants. Focus group prompts queried community awareness of clinical trial opportunities, barriers and facilitators to deaf people's participation in clinical trials, and recommended resources to improve clinical trial access. This qualitative focus group data is supplemented by survey data gathered from 40 principal investigators and clinical research coordinators between November 2021 and December 2021. The survey queried researchers' prior experiences with enrolling deaf participants in clinical trials and strategies they endorse for enrollment of deaf participants in future clinical trials.
Results:
Focus group participants unanimously agreed that, compared to the general hearing population, deaf sign language users lack equivalent access to clinical trial participation. Reported barriers included lack of awareness of clinical trial opportunities, mistrust of hearing researchers, and refusal by clinical trial staff to provide accessible communication (e.g. denial of requests for sign language interpreters). Survey data from 40 principal investigators and clinical research coordinators corroborated these barriers. For example, only 2 out of 40 survey respondents had ever enrolled a deaf person in a clinical trial. Respondents indicated that the most helpful strategies for including deaf sign language users in future clinical trials would be assistance with making recruitment information accessible to deaf sign language users and assistance in identifying qualified interpreters to hire to help facilitate the informed consent process.
Conclusion:
The lack of communication accessibility is the most common factor preventing deaf sign language users from participating in clinical trials. This article provides recommendations for hearing researchers to improve deaf people's access to clinical trials moving forward, drawing from mixed-methods data.
... The Deaf community is a culturally and linguistically distinct minority group characterized by unique communication forms, social relationships, and interactions with the hearing world. In the United States, up to one million d/Deaf and hard of hearing (d/Dhh) individuals use American Sign Language (ASL) as their primary language (Mitchell et al., 2006). ASL is a visual-gestural language, with its own in ASL, and health information in ASL on the Internet is limited (McKee et al., 2015). ...
... From 2017 to 2018 alone, the proportion of students in middle and high school using e-cigarettes increased 50% and 75%, semantic and syntactic structure, vocabulary, grammar, and morphology (Johnston, 2006). ASL is not closely related to English linguistically, and there is no written version of the language (Mitchell et al., 2006). For many d/Dhh people, English is not their preferred language, and average English reading comprehension levels continue to be below grade level (Traxler, 2000). ...
School-based programs are an important tobacco prevention tool. Yet, existing programs are not suitable for Deaf and Hard-of-Hearing (DHH) youth. Moreover, little research has examined the use of the full range of tobacco products and related knowledge in this group. To address this gap and inform development of a school-based tobacco prevention program for this population, we conducted a pilot study among DHH middle school (MS) and high school (HS) students attending Schools for the Deaf and mainstream schools in California (n = 114). American Sign Language (ASL) administered surveys, before and after receipt of a draft curriculum delivered by health or physical education teachers, assessed product use and tobacco knowledge. Thirty-five percent of students reported exposure to tobacco products at home, including cigarettes (19%) and e-cigarettes (15%). Tobacco knowledge at baseline was limited; 35% of students knew e-cigarettes contain nicotine, and 56% were aware vaping is prohibited on school grounds. Current product use was reported by 16% of students, most commonly e-cigarettes (12%) and cigarettes (10%); overall, 7% of students reported dual use. Use was greater among HS versus MS students. Changes in student knowledge following program delivery included increased understanding of harmful chemicals in tobacco products, including nicotine in e-cigarettes. Post-program debriefings with teachers yielded specific recommendations for modifications to better meet the educational needs of DHH students. Findings based on student and teacher feedback will guide curriculum development and inform next steps in our program of research aimed to prevent tobacco use in this vulnerable and heretofore understudied population group.
... While representation has been discussed broadly across HCI and accessibility [1,100] or within specific communities [114,138], we have only seen a few studies analyzing representation and characteristics pertained to AI training datasets in related work [15,82]. ...
As data-driven systems are increasingly deployed at scale, ethical concerns have arisen around unfair and discriminatory outcomes for historically marginalized groups that are underrepresented in training data. In response, work around AI fairness and inclusion has called for datasets that are representative of various demographic groups. In this paper, we contribute an analysis of the representativeness of age, gender, and race & ethnicity in accessibility datasets-datasets sourced from people with disabilities and older adults-that can potentially play an important role in mitigating bias for inclusive AI-infused applications. We examine the current state of representation within datasets sourced by people with disabilities by reviewing publicly-available information of 190 datasets, we call these accessibility datasets. We find that accessibility datasets represent diverse ages, but have gender and race representation gaps. Additionally, we investigate how the sensitive and complex nature of demographic variables makes classification difficult and inconsistent (e.g., gender, race & ethnicity), with the source of labeling often unknown. By reflecting on the current challenges and opportunities for representation of disabled data contributors, we hope our effort expands the space of possibility for greater inclusion of marginalized communities in AI-infused systems.
... Over 70 million Deaf and Hard of Hearing (DHH) people worldwide use one of the over 300 sign languages recognized by the World Federation of the Deaf [12,48]. In the U.S., increasing numbers of DHH and hearing individuals are motivated to learn American Sign Language (ASL), which is used by about 500,000 people as a primary form of communication [46]. There are nearly 200,000 students in ASL classes [15] at schools or universities, and ASL has one of the fastest growing enrollments among language classes [17]. ...
... American Sign Language (ASL) is used by about half a million people in the U.S. as a primary form of communication [21]. ASL classes Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. ...
Advancements in AI will soon enable tools for providing automatic feedback to American Sign Language (ASL) learners on some aspects of their signing, but there is a need to understand their preferences for submitting videos and receiving feedback. Ten participants in our study were asked to record a few sentences in ASL using software we designed, and we provided manually curated feedback on one sentence in a manner that simulates the output of a future automatic feedback system. Participants responded to interview questions and a questionnaire eliciting their impressions of the prototype. Our initial findings provide guidance to future designers of automatic feedback systems for ASL learners. CCS CONCEPTS • Human-centered computing → Interaction design process and methods; Accessibility design and evaluation methods; • Applied computing → Computer-managed instruction.
Soon, smartphones may be capable of allowing American Sign Language (ASL) signing and/or fingerspelling for text entry. To explore the usefulness of this approach, we compared emulated fingerspelling recognition with a virtual keyboard for 12 Deaf participants. With practice, fingerspelling is faster (42.5 wpm), potentially has fewer errors (4.02% corrected error rate) and higher throughput (14.2 bits/second), and is as desired as virtual keyboard texting (31.9 wpm; 6.46% corrected error rate; 10.9 bits/second throughput). Our second study recruits another 12 Deaf users at the 2022 National Association for the Deaf conference to compare the walk-up usability of fingerspelling alone, signing, and virtual keyboard text entry for interacting with an emulated mobile assistant. Both signing and virtual keyboard text entry were preferred over fingerspelling.
Deaf adults often rely on sign language interpreters and real-time captioners for language access during healthcare consultations. While deaf adults generally prefer that these access services be offered in person, previous studies have described that many healthcare providers frequently resort to employing video remote interpreting (VRI) or remote captioning services because of the lack of locally available qualified interpreters or captioners and because of a shorter turnaround time for availing these services. VRI equipment typically consists of a tablet mounted on a utility cart, whereas captions are usually displayed on handheld tablets. These approaches present visibility and cognitive challenges for deaf adults who then need to divide their attention between the interpreting or captioning display and the healthcare provider, thereby affecting their ability to thoroughly access health information shared during consultations. This study proposes augmented reality (AR) smart glasses as an alternative to traditional VRI and remote captioning services for optimizing communication access in healthcare settings. A descriptive study about the perspectives of deaf adults (N = 62), interpreters (N = 25), and captioners (N = 22) on using a smart glasses application for language access in healthcare and biomedical settings are discussed. Results showed that deaf adults who primarily use sign language interpreting and interpreters prefer onsite language access services but identified the benefits of implementing a smart glasses application whenever onsite access services are unavailable or not feasible. Additionally, deaf adults who rely primarily on captioning and captioners prefer the smart glasses application over traditional captioning methods.KeywordsHuman-centered computingAccessibility design and evaluation methodsDeaf and hard of hearingAugmented RealityCommunication accessHealthcare and Medical
How many people use American Sign Language (ASL) in the United States? In short, I can’t really say, but I will tell you what I have learned when I search for an answer to today’s question. En route to providing an answer, I address a number of issues related to the demography of deafness and ASL use, including problems of measurement and enumeration. Ultimately, an estimate of the number of “primary users” of ASL in 1972 can be made based upon the somewhat narrow definitions in the National Census of the Deaf Population. There were 276,888 prevocationally deaf (PVD) good signers (prevocational: prior to 18 years of age; good signer: self-report of signing ability) and 202,741 children born to prevocationally deaf couples (CODA) in which the mother is a good signer (hearing CODA only, because deaf already counted), which totals 479,629 (roughly one-half million) “primary users” of ASL in the USA in 1972.
The perspective that deaf people should be regarded as a cultural and language minority group rather than individuals with an audiological disability is gathering support among educators, linguists, and researchers involved in the education of deaf people across America. This book explores the notion that deaf people are members of a bilingual-bicultural minority group, whose experiences often overlap with the those of hearing minority group members, but at other times are unique. Contributors to this book include prominent deaf and hearing researchers, educators, and deaf community members. The three sections review research on bilingualism and biculturalism, the impact of cultural and language diversity on the deaf experience, and offer rich experiential evidence from deaf community members which highlights the emotional impact of living in the deaf and hearing worlds.
The perspective that deaf people should be regarded as a cultural and language minority group rather than individuals with an audiological disability is gathering support among educators, linguists, and researchers involved in the education of deaf people across America. This book explores the notion that deaf people are members of a bilingual-bicultural minority group, whose experiences often overlap with the those of hearing minority group members, but at other times are unique. Contributors to this book include prominent deaf and hearing researchers, educators, and deaf community members. The three sections review research on bilingualism and biculturalism, the impact of cultural and language diversity on the deaf experience, and offer rich experiential evidence from deaf community members which highlights the emotional impact of living in the deaf and hearing worlds.
Successful interaction with patients who are deaf or hard of hearing requires an understanding of background issues, including the significance of the age of onset of deafness, the patient's cultural identification and educational history, and the type of hearing loss. All of these factors should influence the physician's interview techniques and use of resources.
The deaf are outsiders in a world largely created and controlled by those who hear. Based on intensive interviewing, observation, and the personal experience of the author (whose parents are deaf), Outsiders in a Hearing World examines the lives of deaf people within a social and historical context. It examines the communities created by deaf people and the identities of their members, and describes and analyzes the everyday interactions between the deaf and the hearing. Drawing on the works concerning other outsiders, this book not only increases our understanding of deafness and the deaf, but of outsiders in general.
In the sign languages of the deaf some signs can meaningfully point toward things or can be meaningfully placed in the space ahead of the signer. Such spatial uses of signs are an obligatory part of fluent grammatical signing. There is no parallel for this in vocally produced languages. This book focuses on American Sign Language to examine the grammatical and conceptual purposes served by these directional signs and demonstrates a remarkable integration of grammar and gesture in the service of constructing meaning.