As more television programs are captioned, it is still not clear how many people are fully able to utilize this technology. Because making use of captions involves "reading television," reading is an essential skill for understanding captions and, by extension, comprehending television programs. The process of reading involves the use of prior knowledge and short-term memory; for individuals who are deaf, it may also require skill in a spoken language (i.e., English) which they have not mastered.
Thus, issues of literacy, conceptual knowledge and memory constraints come to bear on the comprehension of television captions. Research to date seems to indicate that most deaf teenagers can only read on a third- or fourth-grade level (Quigley, 1982). Nonetheless, captioned television and films (which are presumably at a higher reading level) are quite popular among school-aged children (Liss & Price, 1981).
Furthermore, when it has been suggested that captions should be "watered down" to a more accessible reading level, members of the Deaf community have cried out, demanding the same information that would be given to a hearing person. Without fluent word reading abilities and adequate background knowledge, however, a deaf person watching television may visually perceive the action, but because the specific information, the subtleties of the conversation or the entire story line of the program are in some way inaccessible the person is only perceiving the program. Fully accessible television may make the difference between perceiving the program and conceptualizing the program.
