Summary:

• Research: Children with hearing impairment had no decreased performance on non-verbal memory and attention tests:

http://jslhr.pubs.asha.org/article.aspx?articleid=1765447

• Some children do have both hearing impairment and cognitive problems
• Much of what looks like cognition skills uses language which makes it hard to assess

How to determine if a skill is being impacted by hearing loss or cognitive deficits (or both):

• Memory/Recall
  • Ask for a non-verbal cognitive test to determine if you need to approach it from a cognitive angle or language
• Answering Questions
  • Test different “wh-” words by asking the same (or similar) question with a different “wh-” word
  • Test if the child can answer questions non-verbally (by pointing to the answer)
• Repeating
  • Try non-verbal imitation like imitating actions
  • Try repeating different types of language, such as full sentences, single words, numbers, letters, etc.