My child was tested using WPPSI III more than a year ago (at 4 years) and his FSIQ was in the mid 140s. What stood out was that his processing speed was in the 80 percentiles (83 percentile to be exact) while all the other criteria were much higher (in the 99.xxx percentile range). It could have been because he could not read at that time - he says the tester used several flash card like things - I am not sure. He has since picked up reading and writing and his vision has been tested and things are fine with his visual processing according to the pediatrician, his K teacher and his eye doctor. I am wondering if his late reading affected how he responded to some questions in the IQ test. We had the testing done by a psychologist as part of the admissions process in a local private school. If his ability to read and interpret words will change the test results, then I might try to get his retested this year. A better score might mean that I am able to apply for some programs that have a higher cutoff on IQ scores than his current score. If the score might not change in any significant way due to this factor, then I might drop the idea of retesting this year. Any advise?
If nothing has been done to improve the issue causing the processing score problem then you will only see change in the IQ relative to the fluctuation of testing so young. WPPSI is designed to test children as young as 3 and isn't focused on reading and writing as those are more achievement related and bias against those for whom English is not spoken in the home.
A discrepancy as large as the one you describe between processing and the other scores is an indication of a learning disability. You may not learn more clues as to what that is until your child is further in school. It can take awhile to figure it all out. Children as bright as yours tend to find ways to compensate for those handicaps making it hard to distinguish what is really going on.
If you choose to test again, it might be helpful to work with a Neuropsychologist so that you can get more information about what the "processing issue" is likely related to. If your child is not yet 6, he may not be able to test on all the batteries that would be helpful just yet.
A discrepancy as large as the one you describe between processing and the other scores is an indication of a learning disability.
Really?
Maybe, maybe not. "Profile analysis" (i.e. determining diagnoses from an IQ profile or scatter alone) can be inexact and is controversial. I've seen slow processing speed on IQ be an artifact due primarily to factors like perfectionism, age of the tester contributing to immaturity and misunderstanding the need to do that part as fast as possible or unwillingness to do so, or a variety of other non pathological factors. I've also seen it occur when there is a problem such as dysgraphia, dyspraxia, ADD (where the speed may not be truly slow but so many mistakes are made on the types of visual scanning and rote tests that IQ processing speed tests entail that the score comes out low)...
My general approach is to only assume a LD or other problem if issues are seen IRL. Do you notice your dc taking longer to complete tasks that are at the appropriate level of instruction? For instance, my one kiddo with true low processing speed can perform extremely highly at tasks that are well above grade level (they are the appropriate level of instruction for her), but she is slow at it. We've always called her "deep, not fast."
Cricket2 gave a much more detailed answer, and 20 seconds sooner too.
FWIW my son scored 27th percentile on Processing Speed and 99.9th percentile on Math Fluency. Sometimes he's slow and sometimes he's fast, so I take all this with a grain of salt.
Thanks to all for such detailed answers. My child likes to do things really, really fast - he is crazy about doing things fast and extremely proud of his ability to finish tasks quickly - but when he is faced with an unfamiliar task, he does not know how to proceed and needs to think and come up with a strategy and he slows down remarkably in those situations and he gets very frustrated with himself. He is also a perfectionist and sometimes refuses to do anything that he knows will result in an imperfect outcome. We are working on his perfectionism issues. I chalked the low processing speed in the results up to immaturity on my child's part. Though I never thought that a processing speed in the 80 percentiles could be a symptom of a LD, it is worth checking out. While writing, he has letter reversals (at age 5) and a horrible handwriting due to fine motor control issues and hates to write and color. He is also diagnosed as color blind. Now, I will wait until he is a little older and use a neuropsychiatrist administered test as suggested above to see what the outcome is. Thank you all for your thoughtful responses.
FWIW my son scored 27th percentile on Processing Speed and 99.9th percentile on Math Fluency. Sometimes he's slow and sometimes he's fast, so I take all this with a grain of salt.
And I have a dysgraphic ds who has a significant dip in Processing Speed on the WISC - and who also has a significant dip in achievement scores marked "fluency" vs others - because they are timed and require handwritten responses. That's the type of analysis that reveals a learning disability (not just looking at IQ scores alone). Neuropsychologists also will typically run additional tests (beyond ability/achievement) to determine if an issue exists when this type of discrepancy occurs - as well as taking a detailed history, interview with parents, etc).
To the OP - the Processing Speed subtests don't require a child to be able to read or to know how to write, but being comfortable with holding a pencil and making marks might make a difference. FSIQ 140+ is a *really* high score - other than DYS and I think Duke (which I don't really know anything about - it's in a different part of the country than where I live) - I don't know of any programs that have admissions bars so high your ds couldn't get in with that FSIQ score. I also don't know if you can calculate it for the WPSSI, but for the WISC you can calculate a GAI which takes out WM and PSI scores, and most of the gifted programs we've encountered will accept GAI in place of FSIQ.
My suggestion is to watch your ds at school - be aware of the things that might have caused a dip in processing speed and *if* you notice other signs of things that might be a challenge (trouble with pencil grip, for instance, or trouble with timed tasks etc) - then seek out a full educational eval to determine if the dip exists and if it's meaningful.
I also was just noticing that the OP is talking about a child with processing speed in the 80th percentile or above not a scaled score in the 80s. Although that is considerably lower than scores in the upper 90s on the other indices, it isn't so much lower that I'd be thinking LD. Many of us with kiddos with concerning discrepancies have kids with differences of 50 percentiles or more.
I also was just noticing that the OP is talking about a child with processing speed in the 80th percentile or above not a scaled score in the 80s. Although that is considerably lower than scores in the upper 90s on the other indices, it isn't so much lower that I'd be thinking LD. Many of us with kiddos with concerning discrepancies have kids with differences of 50 percentiles or more.
Oh yikes, I read the OP quickly and was thinking "80"s as the actual PSI, not 80th percentile. 80th percentile I most likely wouldn't even blink over - the reason for that amount of dip might be as simple as a 4 year old who's poking along and doesn't understand that they are being timed. Sooo... if that's what happened, I think chances are that you *might* see an increase in processing speed when he's tested when he's older and "gets it" that for that specific set of subtests you need to make your marks quickly and move along. OTOH, I'd beware that there's always a chance with the next round of testing that you'll see another part of the scores actually go down - that's happened with one of my dds (across the board), and for my 2e ds, his PRI vs VIQ scores have been split each time he was tested, but in opposite directions both times. Sooo... just keep in mind, any one test is a snapshot taken on one day - there's always the chance that you don't capture the full picture on any one test.
It seems very unprofessional if they told you that. There are obviously many possible causes for a difference in scores.
It would be much more helpful if you had information to share rather than attacking the professionalism of those with more training than you without backing it up. I enjoy the discussion much more when people are contributing rather than being catty. Perhaps that was not your intent?
It seems very unprofessional if they told you that. There are obviously many possible causes for a difference in scores.
It would be much more helpful if you had information to share rather than attacking the professionalism of those with more training than you without backing it up. I enjoy the discussion much more when people are contributing rather than being catty. Perhaps that was not your intent?
Agreed. I was also told the same thing about my son, who has a nearly 60 point discrepancy between his processing speed PSI and the other three. Being told this was what encouraged us to figure out what else was going on and not dismiss it. Oherwise, we were told "oh thwt is just perfectionism" or "all kids have strengths and weaknesses". Two years later, we finally landed on DCD with dysgraphia, which all now makes PERFECT sense. We wouldn't have gotten there without a push that something wasn't quite right.
That said, 80th-ish percentile is not a lot of a discrepancy, I also missed it too. You want to look for more than one standard deviation (some psychs say two, depending on how high then IQ is) as a possible indication, not as a hard and fast rule.
So as not to ignore the OP (sorry, we tend to get off topic here at times!), I would generally say that learning to read would not improve IQ scores. Improved motor efficiency, especially in the area of small motor skills, might improve processing speed scores, though.
The WISC technical report #3, on the other hand () essentially seems to support profile analysis by giving the typical scoring patterns for children with various disabilities. I do wish that they had included 2e kids in this chart, too, though and the typical gifted scores they showed seemed awfully low to me in areas like VCI and PRI.
A couple articles discussing slower processing in gifted children (and, again, I really don't think that the OP's child qualifies as having slower processing here):
22b I think you should also keep in mind that posters talking about what they have been told are reporting conversations in direct relationship to their own child. Professionals will often speak in general terms "patterns like this can mean..." But they are there to talk to this set of parents about this particular child and they presumably saw something themselves or were asked (or told) something by the parent that lead them down that conversational path. I am sure their are a few less good psychologists around somewhere making diagnosis on profile analysis with no prompting from child or parent - but I would expect parents in that scenario generally end up on forums asking if something is REALLY wrong with their kid that's having no problems, not feeling trusting and like maybe someone finally understood their kid....
A discrepancy as large as the one you describe between processing and the other scores is an indication of a learning disability.
Really?
Originally Posted by 22B
Originally Posted by HappilyMom
This is what I have been told by 2 psychologists and a neuropsychiatrist. If you have other information perhaps you will share it.
It seems very unprofessional if they told you that. There are obviously many possible causes for a difference in scores.
Originally Posted by HappilyMom
It would be much more helpful if you had information to share rather than attacking the professionalism of those with more training than you without backing it up. I enjoy the discussion much more when people are contributing rather than being catty. Perhaps that was not your intent?
22B I am not exactly sure why you have staked claim on this issue so vehemently. I don't think any of us are saying that you can diagnose a learning disability from the WISC. Our Ed psych and neuropsych both said it was an indication that we should do more testing and looking to confirm or deny a learning disability. Why else would you test, then disregard the information that comes out of the test? It obviously isn't the complete profile- there are many problems you cannot even get a hint from on the WISC. But there is nothing unprofessional about saying "This is an unusual profile, we should look into it." In fact, that is exactly what many of us are paying for.
I don't think any of us are saying that you can diagnose a learning disability from the WISC.
But that is what HappilyMom said.
Originally Posted by HappilyMom
A discrepancy as large as the one you describe between processing and the other scores is an indication of a learning disability.
There all kinds of innocent explanations for a discrepancy, especially one that's only about 1 SD as in the OP's case. There have been plenty of threads in this forum with much bigger gaps than that, and the consensus seems to be that it's usually no big deal.
"...is an indication..." does not equal a diagnosis, any more than "limping is an indication of a leg injury" tells you that there definitely is a leg injury or what kind, it's just an indication of a possible problem that needs investigation, with a limp you might start by checking if the person just stubbed their toe, with an uneven iq profile you might start with "does this kid have any real world problems?". And as I said in my last post, these conversations between parents and a psychologist are held about a particular child, for a particular reason, so they may already know about the real world problems and therefore not include "possible" in front of "indication of".
"Indication" and "diagnosis" may not be synonyms, but in the context of HappilyMom's post they convey the same idea. HappilyMom said that the "discrepancy" in the OP's child's results "is an indication of a learning disability". It's pretty clear to me what this means.
As Cricket2 said " "Profile analysis" (i.e. determining diagnoses from an IQ profile or scatter alone) can be inexact and is controversial." Evidently this is something some "professionals" are doing, and it is the viewpoint expressed in HappilyMom's post, and attributed to 3 "professionals" she talked to.
I didn't want the OP to be unnecessarily alarmed by that viewpoint. Fortunately all the other posts provide the appropriate counterview.
That kind of discrepancy is probably pretty common even in HG children, and in PG ones, it's a rare individual that doesn't have an asynchronous area of (relative) weakness.
It's not that they are not going to eventually have a high level of performance/mastery-- just that at the moment, that particular domain is in the shade of the other areas of strength.
I'd actually go so far as to say that this is THE biggest problem that I face as a parent; how to manage that asynchrony so that DD doesn't internalize it as "I'm not good at," when that is the only really logical thing, at least in context.
She's a VERY good writer. She's a VERY good mathematician. Just not PG in those two domains, which have (functionally) limited her academic acceleration, though not as much as her underlying maturity and EF have.
It's a serious problem not just for psychologists, but also for anyone that has to live with this kind of asynchrony.
As for the titular question, I think that the theoretical answer must be "no," but the practical one might be "maybe" instead.
Theoretically, IQ testing doesn't depend on the person's LEVEL of attainment/achievement, but is adaptive to reflect the developmental level at which the subject presents. So it wouldn't be appropriate to IQ test a high school student using the same tool as a preschooler.
Pragmatically, however, there are not an unlimited series of endlessly adaptive tools to choose from, and therefore, if a tester selects on the basis of an assumption about attainment/achievement (e.g. that a subject can read independently) which turns out to be false, then yes, the scores might be invalid.
In that situation, using a different tool might well lead to higher scores.
That's not an "improvement" in IQ, though-- it's correction of a measurement error.
This interests me as I've been exploring how DS6s fine motor difficulties would impact taking the wisc iv and whether to ask the tester to consider subtest substitution. I know the OP was discussing the wppsi but I think the wisc is relevant.
Trying to understand if the processing speed index (PSI) on the wisc is "supposed" to be incorporating fine motor at all I have been reading a wisc assessment manual. If the wisc intent of timing the response was to time fine motor response, or even to time mental motor planning time, then I wouldn't want to try to avoid ds having that assessed by substituting something that was easier on the fine motor skills. But if the PSI is supposed to reflect only the speed of premotor mental aspects then I do not want his fine motor issues to obscure that. I of course want a score to honestly reflect what it is supposed to so that he's correctly pigeon holed as to needs.
Anyways, here's a couple quotes:
a. "Consider the 4 WISC-IV indexes. Subract the lowest Index from the highest Index....Is the size of the standard score difference less than 1.5 SDs (<23 points)? If yes then the FSIQ may be interpreted as a reliable and valid estimate of a child's global intellectual ability."
b. If there is more than 1.5 SDs between the highest and lowest Index, and the difference between the VCI (verbal) and PRI (perceptual reasoning) is less than 1.5 SDs "then the GAI may be be calculated and interpreted as a reliable and valid estimate of the child's global intellectual ability".
To me this mainstream interpretation of the wisc iv (Flanagan and Kaufman, Essentials of WISC IV Assessment) is saying that of the 4 indexes, the VCI and PRI are the most essential aspects to gifted identification and that a relative weakness in WMI (working memory) or PSI (speed) should not prohibit a child from being recognized as gifted. How they decide that scores specifically further apart than 1.5 standard deviations represent "unfairly" (my word) decreased scores I don't know.
They also note that in gifted children the most common index to be lower is the processing speed. Ie that that some degree of lower processing speed would be considered normal.
There do seem to be quite a few schools/programs that only accept FSIQ. And I would guess that many of those do not use GAI not because they feel WMI and PSI are important (ie that they on purpose want to exclude children with lower working memories or with slightly slower speeds) but because they haven't actually thought about it or don't know they should. A few schools and programs likely have thought it through and did get some expert advice and made a conscious decision that they do not agree with many other experts and that they do only want the children in their program that are exceptionally fast and have exceptional working memories. Likely if one just asks the program/school, they'll have no idea why they only accept FSIQ.
The types of things that seem to lower WMI or PSI are poorer auditory memory, poorer visual memory, poorer working memory (holding info in your head while working with it). For PSI weaker thinking speed, ie needing to mull things over before answering. But a whole host of other things can lower those also: actual visual difficulties such as keeping one's spot on a page, ability to direct attention, ability to maintain intense concentration, ability to search for visual features. How experienced one is at knowing when is the critical moment to listen carefully to verbal info (ie if one is thinking of questions about the instructions when the actual question is read and you are so good at internal focus that you don't hear the question, and you don't get a redo, then speed will be impacted). If a child has been part of a quick moving preschool program they might have more experience with listening to instructions than one who hasn't. And then on the output end to quickly find and indicate a visual choice or make a understandable verbal output. So for example a super quick thinking child who likes to give a background or discuss things or ask a lot of questions could be penalized for time. Even extraneous comments by a chatty child can impact speed. For example, during one of the timed tests perhaps a child immediately knows the answer but first says, "You know, I have a book at home with illustrations that look just like these. Do they say who did these illustrations?", and then points and says "There, that's the answer". As far as I can tell they would be docked by the amount of time they took to say their extraneous sentence because the timer starts at the end of the tester asking the question and ends when the child indicates the answer.
Anyways, if the goal is to access a school/program that only accepts FSIQ then one would want to fully assess all aspects of the child's abilities and personality too that could impact the WMI and PSI, before having them take the WISC or retake the wppsi. There might be things one finds that would suggest a supplemental subtest be used instead of a core subtest. Or there might also be simple things one could say to the child on the day of the test that would help them show themselves best. For some kids it's more effective to say, "this is a test" than "you are going to do some puzzles". For others the reverse would be better at making them do their best.
One of the things that's hit me over and over as I'm reading about wisc assessment is that a well trained thoughtful tester can provide an enormous amount of information about the learning strengths or needs of the child, way beyond just these score number totals. A well trained tester will also get more accurate scores because they will have the ability to check in and see if the child fully understands the task before starting (once the timer is going it's going), they'll better know when they are allowed to remind the child to finish, etc. So no matter the goal, a really experienced good tester is important.
It's not a test where the tester just presents the parts in order and sits back until the child is done. For example, a tester is supposed to watch the child while they do the tests and note how they are planning their approach, what their eye movements are (giving insight to how they are thinking about the task), whether they brush over easy things too quickly, whether they give up easily when it gets hard, the number of words in their response, whether they get to the point or beat around the bush, what types of things distract them, etc. After the child is gone they look at the patterns of responses and how the scores change through the test (ie get over initial worry, get more into it with time, or get tired or bored of testing), patterns of scores, etc. There are very specific moments a tester should say very specific things, prompt a child to continue or ask a child if they can explain more, etc. An inexperienced tester might err on the side of not saying as much because they are unsure of the rules.
Anyways, to the OP maybe one place to start would be make an appointment with the original wppsi tester and see what else they can tell you based on their notes from their testing session back at age 4. A conversation with them or them reviewing their notes might help know where to start with the lower processing score. At the same time try to gauge their experience level, how many wppsis they give a year or whether they recorded insightful comments about your child's learning style versus just having a pure numerical score.
It may also help to talk more to the next tester about your child's particular personality. Ie with my anxious child if the tester says, "Don't forget to go as fast as you can, I am timing this", my child might break down and cry when they don't finish a section in the time allotted, and then because of their emotional distress bomb the rest of the test. Instead the tester says, "Don't forget to take your time, we are timing this but because some of the tasks are designed for teenagers it's normal to not finish every single thing".
22B- Again, I think it was quite clear that some people misinterpreted 80 in the original post to be the subtest score not the percentile ranking. That has been clarified. However, it is also important to note that other people, beyond the original poster, do read these threads. A person coming along and reading that there is a 40, 50 or 60 point difference in subtest scores should MOST DEFINITELY take that as an INDICATION that something else might be going on and investigate further.
Indication by definition, does not state there is a problem. It is a sign of a potential problem. Sometimes a lump is cancer, sometimes it is a pimple. The lump is an indication of something happening.
Just as you cannot make a diagnosis from an indication on the WISC, nor should you disregard the information completely. Perhaps it's an indication of perfectionism, a learning disability, a visual tracking issue, an attitude problem or a lack of sleep that day. Regardless, if you are going to bother to test, you should also bother to consider the information presented.
As to the OP, I do not think a discrepancy of that amount would qualify as a true learning disability. Whether or not it meets Webb's "functional" learning disability definition, well you'd need further information. Only you know your child's personality and mood on that day and whether or not it's reliable data or not.
Squishys, what I'm reading does not include the exact phrases that the tester must use in introducing the subtests (those are not meant for anyone but testers to see). I do not know if the actual test instructions mention timing at all or not.
As the tester will be repeatedly touching the timer I would imagine the child would see it. My child would be likely to ask what the timer is for and thereafter ask before or during each part whether it's timed or not, want to know how many seconds each part took, etc. I imagine either his direct questions or his tendency to get distracted might lead a tester into making comments about timing. .
This assessment guide's comments are all very rational sounding. It recommends, "be subtle, not distracting, when using a stopwatch". If children ask if they are being timed say, "yes but you don't need to worry about that". They also say "If possible, use a stopwatch that does not make beeping sounds".
Polly my DD was not told, when doing the Coding subtest of the WPPSI (at 4.5), that it was a race, timed, she had to do as much as she could as fast as she could, or anything like that. She was told HOW to do the task, demonstrated one or two items to prove she understood and then set to it. So she did each item exactly twice (perfectly), and then put down her pencil and watched the timer for the second half of the available time. She scored 10 for what she did (perfectly average score achieved in half the available time with no errors). Once she'd put down the pencil no amount of coaxing would make her do more, but if she'd be told it was a race, or to do as many as she could, or SOMETHING beforehand she almost certainly would have kept going.
Once she'd already decided she'd finished the test perfectly, she so was not going to do anymore. It was obvious to me, as her mother, that she felt doing each one twice and with no errors demonstrated mastery and that was all that was required. The psychologist came up with some completely hair-brained explanation that I can't even remember accurately now. I think she said my DD "was uncertain how to do the rest" Seriously? No errors, each one done exactly twice and you think she doesn't know how to do more identical problems? She's bored witless and was not forewarned that volume or speed mattered. The coding test is completely mind numbing, I wouldn't do more than I had to either.
Thank you so much for all the insight. As I posted before, I am going to wait a little while longer and retest - maybe use another method than WPPSI. My son said (at that time) that there were flashcards with words and pictures in the test - and that he could not read the words and had to ask to see the flash card again - for example a picture of a fish with a word "Lion" written on it - and he was asked to tell the tester if the word and the picture matched (this is what I understood from him). Another tricky question was to identify the odd object in a picture - it had a lot of things in one color and a single object being in another color. He is diagnosed as colorblind for shades of Red and Green, so he really cannot see some of the shades of color and we did not have that diagnosis at testing time. I am beginning to believe that testing during early childhood can have a wild range of results that reflects a child's mood, knowledge base, abilities and also the child's understanding of what the testing is about (he was told that he was going to a room to play some "puzzles and fun games" by the tester and he was set to have "fun" rather than finish tasks in a timely manner). The private school we tested for rejected my son based on the IQ test, which is why I had a suspicion that a deviation in number for processing speed could well be an indicator of a LD (in their eyes atleast) and they did not want to do the "hard work" of educating a student who might require special effort. I am glad that I came out of lurkdom to ask this question. And I am overwhelmed that so many of you took so much time to respond to me. Thank you!
Mumofthree, sorry to hear your DD had that experience. I hope it has not stood in the way for her. I wonder if some testers might see a 4 year old having an emotionally based lack of completion as a "spoiled" subtest and therefore administer a supplemental subtest to be used instead in score calculation. That would seem fair to me were I a test author as I don't think at that age they are meaning to test simple compliancy. Or maybe they are.
Ashley -- Just for future reference, the wisc iv guide I am reading mentions the matrix reasoning subtest specifically as more difficult to interpret if a child has color blindness. ie it sounds like there may be some aspects that depend on color recognition.
Polly she wasn't bothered at all, I was cranky about it pulling her fsiq down and having to retest because school "didn't see it".... Retested 6 months later wih a gifted specialist (who said she would have discarded a subtlest like that as spoiled), and sure enough DD gained half an SD on the FSIQ, half of which came from not having that one much lower subtest in the mix. The other half of the improvement came from a higher VS score on the sb5 than PRI on the wppsi. Both my kids did better on the non verbal section of the sb5, but had almost no difference on the verbal, not sure why.
. Ashley -- Just for future reference, the wisc iv guide I am reading mentions the matrix reasoning subtest specifically as more difficult to interpret if a child has color blindness. ie it sounds like there may be some aspects that depend on color recognition.
That's interesting Polly - my ds is red-green color bond and did really well on matrix reasoning, but had a dip in picture concepts. Is the guide you're reading online? I'm just wondering if there are other places in the WISC where color blindness might be an issue.
. Ashley -- Just for future reference, the wisc iv guide I am reading mentions the matrix reasoning subtest specifically as more difficult to interpret if a child has color blindness. ie it sounds like there may be some aspects that depend on color recognition.
That's interesting Polly - my ds is red-green color bond and did really well on matrix reasoning, but had a dip in picture concepts. Is the guide you're reading online? I'm just wondering if there are other places in the WISC where color blindness might be an issue.
polarbear
This is very interesting to me. DS5 tanked on both Picture Vocabulary and Matrix reasoning, did very well (98th percentile) on other sections, and is red/green colorblind. I would love to see that guide, too. They only do a very abbreviated set of Woodcock Johnson and WISC, so the two sections had a large impact on his overall score.
Just another data point on the red/green colorblindness: my son, like polarbear's, did very well on Matrix Reasoning and is quite colorblind. Picture Concepts was pretty respectable, too. (Coding...now, that's another story.)
Regarding color blindness: The reason that some kids with color blindness do well in picture concepts is because there are "varying degrees" to color blindness. Some can identify only certain shades of red/green colors and some cannot identify any shades of red/green colors. The children who are bright learn to compensate for their color blindness by identifying these colors by their "brightness" and "intensity". My son gets thrown for a loop when he encounters the shades of brown that are created from a combination of green and red. Brown looks like green to him. And he used to pick up a brown crayon and color grass as brown - he has since learnt to read the name of the color on the crayon before making his color choice - his way of compensating for his handicap. And he is marginally better at recognizing colors on paper than on an electronic screen. The reason we suspected color blindness and had it tested was that he was working on an online "gifted" program - in the logic test he was taking there was a question about 3 frogs - an yellow, green and brown frog and he was asked to click on the correct frog. The answer to the question was "green frog" - my son said "green frog" verbally and repeatedly picked the picture of the brown frog and clicked on it and got the prompt that said "wrong answer". He was frustrated and sad and was in tears because he could not get it right even though he knew the correct answer. What I am trying to say is that logic reasoning tests do not take into account such discrepancies in abilities (even though the tester knows that such things do not affect the IQ of the child). I am pretty convinced that these factors skew the outcome of IQ tests - especially when administered by a psychologist as part of a busy day where there are a dozen or more kids scheduled to go one after the other for school admission testing.
