A Comparison Of Methods For Calculating A Severe Discrepancy Between Ability And Achievement Using The Wisc R Piat And K Abc

Author : Tracie Lozano
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 154 pages
Book Rating : 4.:/5 (193 download)

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Download or read book Predicting Handicap Categories written by Tracie Lozano and published by . This book was released on 1988 with total page 154 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The purpose of this study was to examine which of two commonly used measure of cognitive functioning (WISC-R and WJTCA) was more accurate in discriminating between two handicapped groups (learning disabled and behaviorally disordered) and a non-handicapped, low achieving control group. In addition, an attempt was made to determine if any specific patterns of subtests (WISC-R) or clusters (WJTCA) would emerge relative to each individual group. It was hypothesized that each group's profile would differ from the other two groups on both measures. The thirty-five subjects used in this study were selected from the elementary and middle school populations of Riverside School District. Riverside is located in a rural area of eastern Washington. Subject population was limited to students who had been referred and assessed for special education. The two handicapped groups were identified by the district as meeting eligibility criteria for handicapped according to current (1986/87) WAC codes. The low achieving group did not meet any of the criteria for handicapped but had been referred for assessment due to low academic achievement. These students are low achievers, i.e., their ability equals their achievement, and differ in this respect from a normal control group. However, the low achiever group was used as a control group as those students who achieve adequately are not referred for assessment and need not be discriminated from others for decisions of educational placement. Males and females were used in the sample and the three groups were equated for age and grade. Age and grade ranged from six years in kindergarten to fourteen years in seventh grade. Full scale IQ scores ranged from 81 to 107 with a mean of 94 on the WISC-R and 78 to 113 with a mean of 91 on the WJTCA. Scores were acceptable if time between administration was one year or less. The WJPEB is an individually administered test that assesses four areas of functioning: Cognitive Ability, Achievement, Interest and Adaptive Behavior. For the purposes of this study only the four cluster scores, Verbal Ability, Reasoning, Visual/Perceptual Speed and Memory were used from the Cognitive Ability Test. The WISC-R is an individually administered test of general intelligence which is composed of twelve subtests. The measure yields both a Verbal and Performance IQ as well as a Full Scale IQ for the entire test. For the present study, only eleven subtest scores were included in the analysis. A stepwise discriminant function procedure was used to analyze the data. This method is used when one wishes to identify variables that are important for distinguishing between groups as well as to develop a procedure for predicting group membership of new cases. The results indicated that the WISC-R more accurately discriminated the learning disabled and behaviorally disordered groups than did the WJTCA. The predictive power was equal for the two instruments with the low achiever group. However, the WISC-R predicted the total group 14.29% more accurately than did the WJTCA. The WISC-R Object Assembly subtest was included in the discriminant analysis for all three groups. The low achiever's relatively low score on this subtest was primarily responsible for this discrimination. The learning disabled and behaviorally disordered group means did not differ significantly from each other on this dimension. The WISC-R Comprehension subtest was included as a discriminating variable for both the learning disabled and low achiever groups. The markedly higher behaviorally disordered group score was responsible for this discrimination indicating that this group differs significantly from the learning disabled and low achiever's on this dimension. The WJTCA Memory cluster was included in the analysis for all three groups. On this dimension, the learning disabled and behaviorally disordered criterion groups did not differ systematically. However, the low achiever group's relatively high score indicates that Memory is a significant factor in discriminating low achievers from others. The Verbal Ability and Reasoning clusters of the WJTCA were specific to the learning disabled group. This group scored lower on both dimensions than did the other two groups. For the behaviorally disordered group, the Vocabulary and Digit Span subtests of the WISC-R were significant in the discrimination. This group scored higher on Vocabulary and lower on Digit Span than did the other two criterion groups. The Visual/Perceptual Speed cluster was significant in discriminating the behaviorally disordered from others. This target group scored significantly higher in this area. The low achiever's Information score on the WISC-R was lower than the other groups which resulted in the discrimination power in this analysis. The results confirm the experimental hypothesis that each groups profile would contain significant differences when compared to the other two groups on both the WISC-R and the WJTCA. Finally, these findings can only be generalized to the sample and the school district population which were used in this study"--Document.