Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Posting IQ test results/Intepretration of them

Vansh, I pm'd you.

Hi aeh,

I just submitted my first forum post as well, but it is stuck in moderation. I'd appreciate your taking a look when it comes through, and sending me a PM if you are able to help with the calculation of the WPPSI-IV GAI from the subtest scores alone.

I just tried to send you a PM, but you seem to be over the limit.

Hi,

the son of my partner is 12 and 6 months
He is has an exceptional talent in music and drawing for his age (i'm highly trained in music so i'm able to judge his level).
He is also highly bored at school. The school he goes now seem to be a low level, so to get things clearer i proposed his parents that he passes the WISC test. Which he did. The psychologist here (small town) only had the WISC-IV and did a terrible interpretation (very poor and wrong on several aspects).

I'm quite new to all these tests but interested, so i studied since few days to interpret his results better.

His results shows a big gap in different aspects of intelligence.
He failed also on things (especially the worst one) because he complicated his way of doing. The exercise in itself is very easy, i verified this with him. But the fact that it was timed and that he suffers from anxiety made him take wrong decisions for his strategy.

We might do more tests, for anxiety, ADHD and asperger.

What i made him do is some fluid reasoning testing as from what i understand from his WISC results, that's where he is very good / excels.
Indeed the exercises focused on fluid intelligence are easy for him.
I suspect Asperger and/or ADHD because he shows signs and also because this discrepancy in results usually shows a disability.
Most aspergers don't do well on WISC/WAIS but great on fluid reasoning tests.

He seems to have a bad short term memory...
To remember numbers and letters he placed in his mind each of them as notes and created a melody, in order to remember letters and numbers in order.
It shows a Synesthesia (confirmed after, he attributes colors to letters etc). With that method he could do well (better auditive memory than visual).


Drawing with cubes, 38 = 11 years and 6 months
Similarities, 27 = 14 years and 6 months
Digit span, 15 = 10 years and 4 months
Pictures concept, 24 = more than 16 years and 7 months
Keys, 33 = 8 years and 2 months (he wouldn't have this low results if not timed, as i double checked his ability on this, anxiety is a big issue)
Vocabulary, 42 = 13 years and 10 months
Succession of numbers and letters, 20 = 15 years (created a music melody to remember)
Matrices, 25 = 14 years and 6 months
Comprehension, 23 = 10 years and 10 months
Find symbols, 28 = 12 years and 6 months

We will address the anxiety and adhd, asperger.
We plan on music, drawing and sciences classes.

I would be grateful for any of your lights on his results as you have the experience i lack.
Any advices on what we could do to improve his best skills (fluid intelligence)?
Maybe some apps that he could use or else to keep learning at home.
He speaks fluently spanish and english.

Thank you in advance
Very looking forward for some analysis from you.
Chaya

Welcome, Chaya!

Am I correct that this assessment was done in Spanish? (I notice that you've listed nonstandard subtest names, which I assume resulted from back-translation from English to Spanish to English).

I'm going to start with some context on testing of this kind that is important in interpreting the results. First, it is generally considered inappropriate to interpret the scores as age-equivalents, except in very rare cases, so I've tried to give some rough approximations for what the scores you've reported actually were in normative terms, with the standard subtest names. Since I don't know which version of the WISC-IV was actually given (Spanish or English), or what the child's actual dominant language (not always clear with dual language learners) or cultural context are, I'm not going to convert these to actual numbers:

Block Design: average
Similarities: average
Digit Span: (beginning of) average
Picture Concepts: extremely high
Coding: very low
Vocabulary: average
Letter-Number Sequencing: average
Matrix Reasoning: average
Comprehension: average
Symbol Search: average

Second, interpretively, we have a few additional cautions: this is a fairly old version of the test (how old depends on where you are in the world and whether it is the Spanish version), and may or may not be based on norms appropriate to the cultural/linguistic/educational context of this child, so the results on any given item or task have an elevated risk of being imprecise in either direction (too high or too low).

So when we look at the results in terms of scaled score classifications instead of age-equivalents (which, again, there are many excellent psychometric reasons for avoiding as much as possible--but that's another, much longer story), we see that most scores are comfortably in the average range, with only two notably outside of it: Picture Concepts, which is indeed in the extremely high range, and coding, which falls in the very low range.

But let's say these do tell us something about his cognitive profile (and that is definitely making some big assumptions). It would suggest that, in the context of generally age-appropriate thinking skills, he is much better at concept formation using concrete images than he is at abstract verbal concept formation, and that his complex pencil skills are slow (notice that he did fine on Symbol Search, which is timed exactly as Coding is, so it's not speed itself that is the issue, but how it interacted with the specific Coding task--which could be due to anxiety, as you suggest, or possibly due to fine-motor coordination and handwriting factors). For what it's worth, the exercise is intended to be--as you note--very easy. The point is completing it efficiently, which can be affected by many different factors, including hand skills, anxiety, attention, fatigue, visual tracking, etc., in addition to pure motor speed.

I would not say the data support a poor short-term memory, but it is possible that he just compensates very well using other methods. I will note that it is quite unusual for exceptional musicians to have low working memory skills, though, as there is some association between rhythmic accuracy/precision and long short-term memory spans.

While it can be true that those on the autism spectrum test less consistently early in life, I would be cautious about interpreting his testing results with a view to diagnostic classifications such as those you list, based only on a few numbers. All of the diagnoses you mention are typically made using multiple measures and a high degree of clinical training and expertise. Asking the question is certainly reasonable, especially if you are seeing other signs in daily life that suggest this, but be open to a very different answer than the one you expected.

Finally, I am happy this young person has so many adults in his life who care about him, and who are trying to help him grow in every way! A child cannot be loved by too many people.