Theory of mind
The lack of socialization can significantly impact a child's emotional well-being. A child's first experience with social communication typically begins at home, but deaf and hard of hearing children in particular who are born to hearing parents tend to struggle with this interaction, due to the fact that they are a “minority in their own family". Parents who have a deaf child typically do not know a signed language, the logistical problem becomes how to give that child exposure to language that the child can access. Without a method of communication between the child and parents, facilitating their child's social skill development at home is more difficult.  By the time these children enter school, they can be behind in this area of development. All of this can lead to struggles with age appropriate emotional development. It will be hard on a child who was not given a language early in life to try and express their emotions appropriately. The problem is not caused by deafness, it is caused by lack of communication that occurs when there is a lack of language access from birth. There is evidence to suggest that language acquisition is a predictor of how a child's ability to develop theory of mind. Theory of mind can be an indicator of social and cognitive development. Without language acquisition, deaf children can become behind in theory of mind and the skills that coincide, which can lead to further social and emotional delays.