WISC characteristics of clinic-referred subgroups of disabled learners

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dc.contributor.authorMcAllister, Mona Ruthen_US
dc.date.accessioned2024-08-14T22:44:18Z
dc.date.available2024-08-14T22:44:18Z
dc.date.copyright1981en_US
dc.date.issued1981
dc.degree.departmentDepartment of Psychology
dc.degree.levelMaster of Arts M.A.en
dc.description.abstractThe initial goal was to determine what proportion of a sample of disabled learners referred to a Neuropsychology Clinic would present with an isolated deficit in either reading or arithmetic rather than a more general handicap affecting both academic areas. Significantly low achievement on the WRAT, using local normative data, was used a criterion of a learning disability. Subjects were screened for primary psychiatric problems. Of the 109 subjects (25 female, 84 male; mean FSIQ of 100; mean age of 10.7 years) 23% had definitely neurological indicators of brain damage, 39% had questionable and 40% had no indicators of brain damage. Of the 109 disabled learners, 94 could be described as reading disabled and 82 as arithmetic disabled using conservative criteria generally accepted in the literature. However, there was considerable overlap between these two categories. Most subjects (86% of the reading disabled and 93% of the arithmetic disabled) were below the normal range in the second academic area and would more accurately be described as generally learning disabled. Relatively few subject (17%) presented with single deficits in either arithmetic or reading. For the six subjects with an arithmetic disability and normal reading achievement, spelling achievement varied from normal to significantly impaired. While these findings need to be replicated, they emphasize a need for careful reporting of pattern of academic deficit in studies of reading and arithmetic disabilities. Clinical category of neurological status did not discriminate between a subgroup with reading plus arithmetic disability (n=67), a subgroup with normal arithmetic but impaired reading (n=13), and a subgroup with normal reading but impaired arithmetic (n=6). In the second part of the study, the potential of information contained in the WISC profile for both diagnostic purposes and for understanding the cognitive strengths and weaknesses of disabled learners was investigated for subgroups formed according to pattern of academic deficit. Distributions of WISC Verbal-Performance discrepancies and of subtests scatter were not abnormal when the three subgroups were compared to the WISC and WISC-R standardization populations. These findings are contrary to common clinical assumptions of the diagnostic usefulness of these two WISC measures. A principle components analysis of the WISC subtest scores supported the recategorization of the subtests into Conceptual, Spatial and Sequential factors, for clinic-referred disabled learners. While no subgroup was consistently characterized by a particular pattern of factor scores, a hypothesis that subjects in a reading plus arithmetic disability subgroup (n=51) would present with a high incidence of a Spatial-Conceptual-Sequential hierarchy of factor scores was supported. Further for 29 of the 30 subjects with this score pattern, the discrepancy between the Spatial and Sequential scores was greater than one standard deviation, suggesting the three factor division of subtests may be more meaningful for these disabled learners than the original Verbal-Performance dichotomy of the Wechsler scale. Four of five subjects with a discrete arithmetic disability presented with a predicted factor hierarchy of Conceptual-Spatial-Sequential. While a low Sequential score has generally been discussed in terms of reading disability, the results of a canonical correlation of WRAT Reading and Arithmetic with the Sequential factor subtests of Arithmetic, Digit Span and Coding, together with step-wise multiple regressions, supported a hypothesis that WRAT Arithmetic has a unique relationship with the Sequential factor not attributable to WRAT Reading.. However, while WISC Arithmetic accounted for most of the variance shared by WRAT Arithmetic and the Sequential subtests, only 49% of the 82 subjects significantly impaired on the WRAT calculations were also impaired on the WISC verbal arithmetic problems. These findings suggest the category of arithmetic disability might meaningfully be subdivided in terms of specific pattern of arithmetic skill impairment, as well as in terms of concomitant achievement in spelling and reading.en_US
dc.format.extent137 pages
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/1828/18894
dc.rightsAvailable to the World Wide Weben_US
dc.titleWISC characteristics of clinic-referred subgroups of disabled learnersen_US
dc.typeThesisen_US

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