Comparison of Pragmatic Competence and Performance in Two Groups of Deaf and Normal Students

There is an assumption that pragmatic competence and performance in deaf loss students is less than normal students, so this research notice to this pragmatic aspects in two groups of deaf students of Baghcheban schools and normal students in Tehran. Subjects were 70 girls and boys from deaf students with severe impaired hearing (70 - 90 dB) and mean of education 15 - 18 in 4 levels high school. Then those comparied with 70 normal students that was matched in terms of sex, educational level, course of education and area of live. Method of research was comparative and cross - sectional. Instruments include questionnaire and pragmatic test (reception and expression of metaphors, reception and expression of proverbs, reception of indirect speech acts, reception of inferential meaning, select of best topic and reception of humour sentences). Then the data was analyzed with the use of Kruskal Wallis test, Mann - Whitney U, t - test and paired t – test. Analysis of data demonstrated significantly different (P < 0.05) between average scale of pragmatic competence and performance in two groups. There was significantly difference between average scale of pragmatic competence and performance with the increase of educational level in hearing loss students also. But there weren’t significantly difference between average scales of pragmatic with the increase of educational level in normal students. The deaf students understand pragmatic competence less then normal students and they are unable to use them appropriative in different contexts and situations.