The focus of this thesis is on hearing-impaired students in higher education. The following problem are formulated: How can one understand the interaction between hearing-impaired students and the academic and social environment of higher education, including the individual student's prerequisites and possibilities as regards higher education, and in what forms? The thesis consists of a study based on the perspective of 11 hearing-impaired students. A combination of several data sources were used. Verbatim transcribed thematized interviews were analysed. In order to understand the action itself, participant observation, video recordings and stimulated recall were used in addition to text interpretations.

The results shows that the impairment in itself was not a determining factor as regards success in University studies. Nor was it possible to discern any connection between communication ability and the results achieved in University studies. It was also not possible to determine whether a person with a congenital hearing-impairment would be less successful in University studies than persons whose hearing was impaired later in childhood. There existed a complex integration problem which meant that considerable effort was often needed to conform to the hearing University world. The study shows how the problem of hearing is both situationally and culturally related as well as being determined by the goals of the hearing-impaired person. A number of obstacles to success were identified. These could arise as an effect of (i) independent study coupled to lectures, (ii) integration problems in conjunction with different types of group activities, (iii) time coupled to pace and efficiency and (iv) marginal contact with teachers/lecturers in many disciplines. The hearing-impaired students had conceptions of what was regarded as a problem, what was seen as a legitimate demand and what were fundamental values in the worlds of persons with and without impaired hearing, respectively. A comparison of the different conceptions of these worlds revealed underlying explanations of why obstacles arose in the encounters between hearing-impaired students and the hearing world of higher education