Assessing Health Behaviors and Mental Health among Deaf Students at CSUN

Federal agencies such as the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration invest substantial amounts of money to prevent risky substance use on college campuses; however, these prevention programs do not reach all types of students. College students who are Deaf or Hard-of-Hearing (D/HH), for example, are not surveyed about their substance use and other health behaviors. Most substance use prevention programs are designed for hearing students. The proposed project between Deaf Studies and Health Sciences will develop an online Deaf Health Screening Tool in ASL and written English to assess the health behaviors and mental health of D/HH students at CSUN. The Deaf Health Screening Tool will be based on the “My Own Health Report” (MOHR) developed by the National Cancer Institute. MOHR includes 22 questions and includes standardized measures for substance use, depression, anxiety, stress, nutrition, and physical activity. The Deaf Health Screening Tool will be designed for use in health settings where D/HH students can receive follow up assessment and care. The project will create an online Deaf Health Screening Tool by translating the established MOHR screening tool into ASL and videotaping the ASL version of each question and response. The MOHR will be adapted by adding five questions: hearing status, language preference, hearing status of parents, language used in the home, and educational background.
Finally the project will pilot test the Deaf Health Screening Tool with at least 38 D/HH students at CSUN or 25% of the total D/HH student population at CSUN.