Employment of deaf people as influenced by potential employers' perceptions: pathological compared with sociocultural perspectives.

Two basic perspectives contrast how people perceive deafness: the pathological and sociocultural perspectives. The pathological perspective focuses on the medical issues related to hearing impairment. The sociocultural perspective views deafness as a cultural difference. This study investigated whether these perspectives influenced assessments of deaf job candidates in a mock hiring scenario. Undergraduates were given information supporting either the pathological or sociocultural perspectives. They later rated deaf and hearing job candidates who were presented as having identical qualifications. The hypothesis was not supported in this study; the experiment did not significantly alter the views of future prospective employers. Also, education about the deaf culture did not appear to have an impact on deaf and hearing relations.

Cerebral lateralization of spatial abilities: a meta-analysis.

There is a substantial disagreement in the existing literature regarding which hemisphere of the brain controls spatial abilities. In an attempt to resolve this dispute, we conducted a meta-analysis to decipher which hemisphere truly dominates and under what circumstances. It was found that across people and situations, the right hemisphere is the more dominant for spatial processing. However, consideration of specific moderator variables yielded a more complex picture. For example, females showed no hemisphere preference while males showed a right hemisphere advantage. Also, no hemisphere preference was indicated for spatial visualization tasks while subjects performing spatial orientation and manual manipulation tasks displayed a predictable right hemisphere preference. These findings are discussed in terms of their implications for exiting theoretical positions as well as future empirical research.