A relatively high proportion of children with a cochlear implant (CI) show a delay in their language and cognitive development. Recent studies suggest a connectionbetween the developments of specific cognitive and language skills. Inductive reasoning(the skill used to detect rules, generalizations and regularities) is connectedto those cognitive skills, as well as to abilities necessary to acquire language. Training of inductive reasoning may improve language and cognitive skills and helpchildren with a CI to catch up with their peers.

In this study, a well-established inductive reasoning training is used. Cognitive andlanguage skills are tested before, immediately after and some months after training.Preliminary results of a group of hearing children show an improvement in syntaxrecognition, syntax production, non-verbal reasoning skills, as well as phonologicallybased word fluency. Furthermore, the inhibition skills of those children performingvery low on inhibition tasks before training improved significantly.A control group is needed to ensure those results are connected to the training andnot to the two-time use of the language and cognitive tests. In addition, a follow-upmeasurement to test the durability of the effects is still remaining to be done.