Abstract

 This work discusses the age pattern of deafness in Nigeria. The ultimate objectives ol the study is to identify those statistical information associated with deal peisons which may be iclevant in the planning and implementation of measures aimed at the icalization ol lull integration ofdeal persons in social life and development. flic data used for this work is from (he 1991 population census of the Federal Republic ol Nigeria. Simple descriptive statistical measures like percentages, rates and cross tabulations were used to discuss the characteristics of the deaf persons, levels ad differentials of deaf persons respectively. Chi-square test was used to test the degree of association between deaf status and their background characteristics. Simple linear regression was applied to investigate the relationship between the proportion ol deal persons and their age. The results of the analysis show that Crude Deal Rate (CDR) is 1.18 pei 1000. Deaf status was found to be significantly associated with backgiound characteristics. The low level of participation of deaf persons in economic activities seems attributable to their poor educational background. 'Ihcrclorc, education ol deal persons al all levels and in all professional areas has been recommended.