Emotional adjustment to a child’s hearing difference is a moving target throughout childhood for both patients and their caregivers. How the child sees themselves, needs to interact with the world, and develop time-period specific skills changes over childhood. As a child grows older, the environments in which they live, learn and play, and the demands and possibilities of these environments also change. Both caregivers and pediatric patients need developmentally appropriate information, skills, and support for healthy social and emotional development throughout childhood into adult life. Pediatric audiologists are uniquely trained, skilled and positioned to promote this healthy development in patients with hearing differences.
This session will provide an overview of key concepts and strategies that can be used to promote healthy social and emotional development in pediatric patients with hearing differences. Learn language that promotes resilience. Learn about why teaching and promoting a child’s self-compassion is more productive than monitoring and promoting a child’s self-esteem. Learn when pediatric patients can developmentally grieve their hearing differences, and what helps them through these feelings to healthy self-acceptance. Learn about age-appropriate strategies to promote healthy social and emotional development in your pediatric patients throughout childhood into their adult lives.
Learning Objections:
- Typical development of self-concept over childhood and strategies for overcoming challenges due to hearing differences
- Typical social and emotional development for children birth through age 21
- Helpful developmental concepts to teach families and patients over childhood
- Strategies to support caregivers’ and pediatric patients’ healthy emotional adjustment to the child’s hearing difference over childhood
