Research reported in educational literature suggests that using visuals in teaching results in a greater degree of learning. The basic premise of this body of research is the concept of visual literacy, defined as the ability to interpret images as well as to generate images for communicating ideas and concepts. This paper provides an introduction to visual literacy and includes a review of stu...

BACKGROUND Health literacy is an important predictor of healthcare outcomes, but research on this topic has largely been absent from the emergency medicine literature. OBJECTIVE We measured the prevalence of health literacy in parents or guardians of pediatric patients seen in the emergency department (ED). METHODS This was an observational study conducted in a Midwestern urban, university-...

To conduct a scoping review on the literature visual aids in health education for persons with low-literacy. A methodology was employed. Pre-defined selection criteria identified 47 studies inclusion. Data were extracted relation to: (a) definitions of low-literacy and literacy, (b) population studied, (c) research country, (d) consent procedures, (e) used, (f) development aids, (g) targeted ou...

We investigated how literacy modifies one of the mechanisms of the visual system that is essential for efficient reading: flexible position coding. To do so, we focused on the abilities of literates and illiterates to compare two-dimensional strings of letters (Experiment 1) and symbols (Experiment 2) in which the positions of characters had been manipulated. Results from two perceptual matchin...

Mini-Mental State Exam (MMSE) scores for 247 community-dwelling, well-functioning individuals in their 60s (n = 88), in their 80s (n = 92), and 100 or older (n = 67) were compared to examine overall and component MMSE differences. The concomitant influences of visual or literacy deficits, gender, education, race, income, and activities of daily living on MMSE performance were analyzed. Mean MMS...

This paper addresses the use of information and communication technologies, ICT or IT for brevity, to combat illiteracy and move participants directly from illiteracy to computer literacy. The resulting assistive technology and instructional software and hardware can be employed to speed up literacy programs and make them more attractive and effective. The approach provides an interactive, self...

A primary tenet underlying American Sign Language/English bilingual education for deaf students is that early access to a visual language, developed in conjunction with language planning principles, provides a foundation for literacy in English. The goal of this study is to obtain an emic perspective on bilingual deaf readers transitioning from learning to read to reading to learn. Analysis of ...