The All-Important Significant Other
In gaining or sustaining motivation we should strive to enroll family members in the rehabilitation process. It is often die family who most readily knows what strategies work best for motivating their loved one.
Because hearing loss creates difficulties when the person with hearing loss wants to hear others, and difficulties for others when they want to be heard, remediation of hearing loss becomes a shared concern. If there were no other party, hearing loss would not be nearly so devastating. The important others in the life of the individual with hearing loss by necessity become important players in the rehabilitation process.
As was discussed in Chapter 4, it is important that both parties appreciate the impact of the hearing loss on the other. Indeed, Miller (1983) has suggested that a significant other accompany the person with hearing loss to every consultation in order to heighten understanding of hearing loss impact. It has been found that when significant others actively participate in early discussions of hearing difficulties, the parent is more likely to report perceived benefit from amplification, possibly because of the"moral support" provided by the significant other (Hoover-Steinwart, English, &Hanley, 2001).If significant others are not afforded the opportunity to learn of the impact of hearing loss through group classes as discussed in the next chapter, this information needs to be conveyed individually.
Certainly significant others need to understand that hearing aids can typically only restore about one-half of the degree of lost hearing resulting in a certain amount of residual deficit. They also need to appreciate the importance of speech recognition loss and that if their loved one only understands 80 percent of words presented under ideal hearing examination conditions one cannot expect perfect speech reception in the real world. Both parties need to understand the speaker, listener, and environmental barriers to effective communication. (See Table 6.4.) Equally important is the appreciation of the difficult communication task me significant other has in delivering their message effectively to the person with hearing loss (Clark, 2002b).
TABLE 6.4 Creating Motivated Learning for Elder Adults
-Make liberal use of concrete specific instructions and tasks.
-Provide a non-evaluative relaxed instruction suggesting the patient is not being tested or compared to others. Self-paced rather than timed tasks will enhance performance.
-Avoid potential distractions such as uncomfortable chairs, inadequate or glaring lighting, irrelevant designs or borders on written information, auditory competition
-Relating tasks to increases in autonomy and independence will build motivation for success.
-A clear purpose to the task to be mastered increases motivation.
-General principles of small linked goals with measurable results build motivation for learning.
-Caution towards risk-taking increases in old age. A need for more certainty in the correctness of responses or actions may require additional time to avoid discouragement.
-Older adults respond Well to self-help and support groups.