Hearing Loss Statistics
Percentage of Individuals with Hearing Loss
Source: Johns Hopkins
A template, PowerPoint slide, is available to customize for your state.
Sound Check Map. Interactive map (webpage). Understanding hearing loss prevalence and increasing awareness of hearing health solutions.
Communication
Of those people who are deaf/Deaf or have a hearing loss, approximately:
- 97.2% to 99% use verbal communication
- 1% to 2.8% use sign language, such as American Sign Language (ASL)
References
- Do All Deaf People Use Sign Language? August 5, 2020 (accessibility.com, webpage)
- How Many People Use Sign Language? A National Health Survey-Based Estimate. Dec 23, 2022 (Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, webpage)
Resources
- Eberts, Shari (August 14, 2023). “Not Everyone with Hearing Loss Knows Sign Language.” Psychology Today
- Ross E Mitchell, Travas A Young (January 2023). “How Many People Use Sign Language?” A National Health Survey-Based Estimate, The Journal of Deaf Studies and Deaf Education, Volume 28, Issue 1, Pages 1–6.
“In sum, sign language use in the USA is substantial (approaching 3% of the adult population in 2014). Though most (around 83%) of the estimated 6.4 to 7.0 million adults claiming to use sign language were hearing, more of whom were women than men, around 1 million deaf and hard-of-hearing adults used sign language (.1 to .2 million of whom specifically identified as deaf— an age-by-sex-adjusted 39%).”