Nonverbal Intellectual Abilities Research Articles

The language cognition interface in ASD: Complement sentences and false belief reasoning

Theory of Mind (ToM) deficits are often attested in Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). Previous work on ASD has identified links between ToM abilities and knowledge of sentential complements, with the hypothesis that this component of language provides a tool for individuals with ASD to figure out solutions to ToM tasks. However studies on ASD are yet to show if the impact of complementation on ToM performance carries over to instances where ToM is assessed nonverbally. As such, the links identified between ToM tasks and complementation tasks may stem from linguistic difficulties that impact scores across the measures used, rather than from the role played by sentential complements in mental representation. This study is the first to evaluate associations between complements and nonverbal ToM in children with ASD compared to typically developing children of similar nonverbal intellectual ability and general language level. Correlations controlling for nonverbal abilities were found between complements and non-verbal ToM success in the ASD group only. Furthermore, regression analyses showed that competence with complement sentences of verbs of communication explained 30% of the variance in their performance at non-verbal ToM. These findings provide new evidence in favour of the view that sentential complements play a role in ToM reasoning in ASD.

Children's intellectual ability is associated with structural network integrity

Recent structural and functional neuroimaging studies of adults suggest that efficient patterns of brain connectivity are fundamental to human intelligence. Specifically, whole brain networks with an efficient small-world organization, along with specific brain regions (i.e., Parieto-Frontal Integration Theory, P-FIT) appear related to intellectual ability. However, these relationships have not been studied in children using structural network measures. This cross-sectional study examined the relation between non-verbal intellectual ability and structural network organization in 99 typically developing healthy preadolescent children. We showed a strong positive association between the network's global efficiency and intelligence, in which a subtest for visuo-spatial motor processing (Block Design, BD) was prominent in both global brain structure and local regions included within P-FIT as well as temporal regions involved with pattern and form processing. BD was also associated with rich club organization, which encompassed frontal, occipital, temporal, hippocampal, and neostriatal regions. This suggests that children's visual construction ability is significantly related to how efficiently children's brains are globally and locally integrated. Our findings indicate that visual construction and reasoning may make general demands on globally integrated processing by the brain.

Predictors of early literacy skills in children with intellectual disabilities: a clinical perspective.

The present study investigated the linguistic and cognitive predictors of early literacy in 17 children with intellectual disabilities (ID) (mean age: 7; 6 years) compared to 24 children with normal language acquisition (NLA) (mean age: 6; 0 years), who were all in the so-called partial alphabetic phase of reading (Ehri, 2005). In each group, children's performances in early literacy skills (phonological awareness, letter knowledge, and word decoding) were assessed, as well as their achievement in linguistic and cognitive measures associated to these skills. The results showed that, notwithstanding the fact that there were no differences in word decoding, children with ID lagged behind on all predictor measures relevant to early literacy skills compared to children with NLA. Moreover, whereas children with NLA showed a regular predictive pathway of early literacy skills, children with ID showed a deviant pattern, in which nonverbal intelligence and rhythmic skills proved to be of major importance. Also letter knowledge appeared to be involved in their early literacy processing. It can be tentatively concluded that in the ID group, children's level of nonverbal intellectual abilities in combination with rhythmic ability proves pivotal in the development of their early literacy skills.

Single nucleotide polymorphism in the neuroplastin locus associates with cortical thickness and intellectual ability in adolescents

Despite the recognition that cortical thickness is heritable and correlates with intellectual ability in children and adolescents, the genes contributing to individual differences in these traits remain unknown. We conducted a large-scale association study in 1583 adolescents to identify genes affecting cortical thickness. Single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs; n=54 837) within genes whose expression changed between stages of growth and differentiation of a human neural stem cell line were selected for association analyses with average cortical thickness. We identified a variant, rs7171755, associating with thinner cortex in the left hemisphere (P=1.12 × 10−7), particularly in the frontal and temporal lobes. Localized effects of this SNP on cortical thickness differently affected verbal and nonverbal intellectual abilities. The rs7171755 polymorphism acted in cis to affect expression in the human brain of the synaptic cell adhesion glycoprotein-encoding gene NPTN. We also found that cortical thickness and NPTN expression were on average higher in the right hemisphere, suggesting that asymmetric NPTN expression may render the left hemisphere more sensitive to the effects of NPTN mutations, accounting for the lateralized effect of rs7171755 found in our study. Altogether, our findings support a potential role for regional synaptic dysfunctions in forms of intellectual deficits.

Acquisition of complement clitics and tense morphology in internationally adopted children acquiring French

The present study examined the language development of children adopted from China to examine possible early age effects with respect to their use of complement clitics, lexical diversity and verb morphology. We focused on these aspects of French because they distinguish second language learners of French and native French-speaking children with language impairment from children learning French as a native language and, in the case of object clitics and certain verb tenses, are relatively late to emerge in native speakers. Thus, it might be expected that they would be susceptible to the delayed onset of acquisition of French experienced by internationally adopted children. Language samples of twelve adopted children from 3;6 to 4;8 living in French-speaking families were analyzed and compared to those of non-adopted monolingual French-speaking children of the same age, sex and socio-economic status. The adopted and control children had similar levels of socio-emotional adjustment and non-verbal intellectual abilities. The adopted children exhibited accelerated language development in general, and there were no significant differences between the internationally adopted and control children with respect to lexical diversity and verb tense. However, the adopted children made significantly more errors using complement clitics, and in particular object clitics, compared to the non-adopted children. The results are discussed in terms of possible effects related to delayed age of acquisition of French.

The relationship between multisensory integration and IQ in children.

It is well accepted that multisensory integration has a facilitative effect on perceptual and motor processes, evolutionarily enhancing the chance of survival of many species, including humans. Yet, there is limited understanding of the relationship between multisensory processes, environmental noise, and children's cognitive abilities. Thus, this study investigated the relationship between multisensory integration, auditory background noise, and the general intellectual abilities of school-age children (N = 88, mean age = 9 years, 7 months) using a simple audiovisual detection paradigm. We provide evidence that children with enhanced multisensory integration in quiet and noisy conditions are likely to score above average on the Full-Scale IQ of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Fourth Edition (WISC-IV). Conversely, approximately 45% of tested children, with relatively low verbal and nonverbal intellectual abilities, showed reduced multisensory integration in either quiet or noise. Interestingly, approximately 20% of children showed improved multisensory integration abilities in the presence of auditory background noise. The findings of the present study suggest that stable and consistent multisensory integration in quiet and noisy environments is associated with the development of optimal general intellectual abilities. Further theoretical implications are discussed.

Spezifische Sprachentwicklungsstörungen

MethodsThirty-three children with diagnosed specific developmental disorders of speech and language and 33 healthy controls matched for age and gender were compared based on their cognitive performance. In this study, a German test for cognitive functions in preschoolers (KET-KID) and a test for nonverbal intellectual abilities (CPM) were used. The aim of the study was to determine possible comorbid disabilities in children with specific developmental disorders of speech and language.ResultsHaving normal nonverbal intellectual abilities, the children with specific developmental disorders of speech and language showed significant impairments in articulation, auditory memory, spatial perception, and visual construction compared with the controls.ConclusionChildren with specific developmental disorders of speech and language show an increased risk for impairment in other cognitive domains. Delayed lateralization development related to cerebral maturation, as well as the associated graphomotor deficits, could have consequences for school performance. Therefore, these children should be tested as early as possible and should receive additional support if required.

Cognitive deficits and developmental language disorders in patients with malformations of cortical development

It is generally accepted that in patients with malformations of cortical development (MCD) the severity of the neurologic and developmental deficiencies is determined by the etiology, localization, and extent of the malformation, as well as by the severity of the associated epilepsy syndrome. Apart from two detailed reports on the occurrence of developmental dyslexia in patients with periventricular nodular heterotopia (Chang et al., 2005, 2007), precise neuropsychological information is available mainly in patients with polymicrogyria (PMG). A first set of studies has addressed the neuropsychological profiles of patients with bilateral perisylvian PMG. In a study of 17 patients with bilateral perisylvian PMG (Montenegro et al., 2001), 7 had bilateral perisylvian PMG limited to the posterior parietal areas, sparing the anterior two-thirds of the sylvian fissure, and 10 had diffuse bilateral perisylvian PMG. In the first group, neurologic examination was normal, seizures were absent, and two had mild dysarthria later in life. In the second group, all had pseudobulbar palsy with or without motor involvement, and seizures were present in four. A second study in 14 patients with bilateral perisylvian PMG (Jansen et al., 2005) showed that exceptionally low intelligence (Full IQ scores <70) was present in <30% of patients, memory abilities were average or low average, frontal lobe function was relatively well preserved, and both receptive and expressive language skills were severely impaired. These findings suggested that the observed cognitive profiles were related to specific areas of cortical dysfunction and not just to global brain dysfunction. This conclusion was supported by a study of six children with bilateral perisylvian PMG (Saletti et al., 2007) in whom mental retardation was related to the extent of cortical malformation, lexical comprehension and verbal production were more compromised than expected from nonverbal intellectual abilities, and lack of verbal language was not compensated by the use of referential gestures. These results suggested that compromised verbal and gestural communication in bilateral perisylvian PMG is not due simply to mental retardation and/or dysarthria but also to dysfunction of the perisylvian areas concerned with the totality of language processing. Care should be taken not to label patients with bilateral perisylvian PMG as mentally retarded, unless proven by detailed neuropsychological studies. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) facilitates early diagnosis, which should result in planning for appropriate education, and allow these individuals to develop to their maximum potential. A second set of studies consisted of patients with a diagnosis of developmental language disorder in whom imaging studies had been performed. Brain MRIs were carried out on a 2T scan and included multiplanar reconstructions

P02-363 - Changes in cognitive functioning during group psychodynamic psychotherapy with young psychotic patients

ObjectivesCognitive impairment is considered to be one of the central features of schizophrenia and it has been so since original descriptions of illness by Kraepelin and Bleuler. Deficits are already present at the first-episode of illness. Some researches conclude that deficits do not change over time, while others suggest that deficits can be reduced. The objective of this research is comparison of cognitive functions of psychotic patients who participated group psychotherapy with those ho did not.MethodIn this paper, by means of Revised Beta Examination (measure of non-verbal intellectual ability) we observe changes in cognitive functioning of 29 psychotic patients who participated in the psychodynamic group psychotherapy within the Early Interventions Program and compare their cognitive achievements with results of matched 32 psychotic patients who received “treatment as usual”. Answers were analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively.ResultsImprovement in cognitive functions was observed in both investigated and control group, but improvement in patients who are participants of long-term psychodynamic group psychotherapy was better than in the group of patients who were not treated in that manner with statistical significance.ConclusionsPsychiatric hospital “Sveti Ivan” offers an extensive outpatient Early Intervention Program for psychotic patients in the critical period of their illness - up to five years from onset. The program includes psychoeducation workshops for the patients and their family members together, group psychodynamic psychotherapy for the patients and group psychotherapy for the family members. Our results indicate better effectiveness of Program when compared to “treatment as usual”.

Variability of Language Abilities of Young 4-Year-Olds who have Williams Syndrome

Variability of Language Abilities of Young 4-Year-Olds who have Williams Syndrome

Neuropsychological outcome following intensity‐modulated radiation therapy for pediatric medulloblastoma

Combined cisplatin chemotherapy and cranial irradiation for treatment of medulloblastoma in children can cause significant ototoxicity and impair cognitive function and quality of life. We have previously demonstrated the conformal technique of intensity-modulated radiation therapy (IMRT) to reduce ototoxicity, however, it has been suggested that IMRT may increase risk of cognitive deficits compared to conventional radiation therapy (CRT). This study compared the impact of the two treatments on measures of neurocognitive functioning. Twenty-five pediatric patients with medulloblastoma were treated either with CRT or IMRT. In addition they received neurocognitive assessments to evaluate long-term functional outcome. Statistical analyses between the two groups were conducted to compare levels and profiles of performance on tests not confounded with hearing loss. When compared to CRT, children treated with IMRT did not perform more poorly on any of the measures. Both groups' mean performance was significantly lower than published norms on several of the measures employed. The benefit of reduced ototoxicity with IMRT does not appear to be at the cost of a decline in nonverbal intellectual abilities, visual-spatial skills, processing speed, or fine motor dexterity when compared to CRT in children with medulloblastoma.

Verbal and Gestural Communication in Children With Bilateral Perisylvian Polymicrogyria

We assessed intelligence and receptive and expressive language skills in 6 children, ages 7 years 9 months to 12 years 4 months, with bilateral perisylvian polymicrogyria of variable extent and with dysarthria of different severity. In view of the recent findings of a close relationship between word and gesture, we also examined the communicative use of gesture. We found that mental retardation was related to the extent of cortical malformation; lexical comprehension, but not morphosyntactic comprehension, and verbal production were more compromised than expected from nonverbal intellectual abilities; lack of verbal language was not compensated by the use of referential gestures. Results are discussed suggesting that compromised verbal and gestural communication in bilateral perisylvian polymicrogyria are not due simply to mental retardation and/or dysarthria but also to dysfunction of Sylvian fissure areas concerned with the totality of language processing.

Apolipoprotein-e influences aspects of intellectual ability in type 1 diabetes.

The epsilon4 allele of the apolipoprotein-E (APOE) gene is associated with poor outcome following various cerebral insults. The relationship between APOE genotype and cognitive function in patients with type 1 diabetes is unknown. In a cross-sectional study of 96 people with type 1 diabetes, subjects were APOE genotyped, previous exposure to severe hypoglycemia was estimated by questionnaire, and cognition was assessed by neuropsychological testing. Cognitive abilities were compared using multivariate general linear modeling (multiple analysis of covariance, MANCOVA) in those with (n = 21) and without (n = 75) the APOE epsilon4 allele. APOE epsilon4 selectively influenced cognitive ability in a sex-specific manner (F = 2.3, P = 0.044, Eta(2) = 0.15); women with APOE epsilon4 performed less well on tests of current, nonverbal intellectual ability (Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised performance test score, P = 0.001, Eta(2) 0.26) and frontal lobe and executive function (Borkowski verbal fluency, P = 0.016, Eta(2) = 0.15). Previous exposure to severe hypoglycemia did not interact with APOE epsilon4 to produce cognitive disadvantage. The APOE epsilon4 genotype is associated with specific cognitive disadvantage in young women with type 1 diabetes. APOE epsilon4 is unlikely to mediate susceptibility to hypoglycemia-induced cognitive disadvantage.

Predictors of Academic Achievement among Homeless and Low-Income Housed Children

Based on a study of sheltered homeless and low-income housed families, predictors of academic achievement among 174 English-speaking children age 6 and older were examined, focusing on housing status, mobility, and race/ethnicity. Days absent from school was hypothesized as the mediating link between homelessness and academic achievement. In multivariate analyses, a composite measure of academic achievement was independently predicted by child's gender (girls scoring higher than boys), race/ethnic status (non-Latino Whites scoring higher than children of color), age, and school mobility. Housing status was not associated with academic achievement. Results indicated that homeless and housed children had comparable rates of absenteeism and other school-related problems, which may explain why homeless and housed children were similar in terms of achievement. Although children of color were equivalent to non-Latino White children in terms of nonverbal intellectual ability, their lower academic achievement scores suggest that they are not reaching their academic potential.

Neuropsychological and neuroimaging findings of developmental dysphasia: A longitudinal case study

This article presents an unusual and interesting neuropsychological and neuroimaging longitudinal study of a child who showed a relatively specific developmental language disorder in the absence of any other significant cognitive, emotional or neurological disturbance. The neuropsychological assessment included tests of intelligence, memory, language and frontal lobe functions. Our patient had a marked developmental language disorder characterized by severe impairment of oral and written language and a restricted vocabulary, even though the comprehension of both spoken and written language was relatively preserved. Moreover, his non-verbal intellectual ability was normal and he showed superior visuoconstructive and visuospatial abilities which suggested good development of right temporoparietal functions. On computerized tomography and magnetic resonance imaging there were no structural abnormalities in those cerebral areas concerned with language, although both neuroimaging studies did show a feasible reversed asymmetry or further atrophy on the left sylvian. It is noticeable that at age 17 a severe deficit in the expressive aspects of language remains. In contrast, visuo-constructive functions have improved. These results suggest a functional reorganization of the brain by increasing non-verbal capabilities. The prognosis in dysphasic syndromes is worse than in acquired aphasia in children, since despite speech therapy, an important language impairment persists during adulthood.

Neuropsychological and neuroimaging findings of developmental dysphasia: A longitudinal case study

This article presents an unusual and interesting neuropsychological and neuroimaging longitudinal study of a child who showed a relatively specific developmental language disorder in the absence of any other significant cognitive, emotional or neurological disturbance. The neuropsychological assessment included tests of intelligence, memory, language and frontal lobe functions. Our patient had a marked developmental language disorder characterized by severe impairment of oral and written language and a restricted vocabulary, even though the comprehension of both spoken and written language was relatively preserved. Moreover, his non-verbal intellectual ability was normal and he showed superior visuoconstructive and visuospatial abilities which suggested good development of right temporoparietal functions. On computerized tomography and magnetic resonance imaging there were no structural abnormalities in those cerebral areas concerned with language, although both neuroimaging studies did show a feasible reversed asymmetry or further atrophy on the left sylvian. It is noticeable that at age 17 a severe deficit in the expressive aspects of language remains. In contrast, visuo-constructive functions have improved. These results suggest a functional reorganization of the brain by increasing non-verbal capabilities. The prognosis in dysphasic syndromes is worse than in acquired aphasia in children, since despite speech therapy, an important language impairment persists during adulthood.

Influence of non-verbal intellectual ability and visuoperceptive skills on continuous visual memory test performance : Hoye, W. E., & Dickson, A. L.

Influence of non-verbal intellectual ability and visuoperceptive skills on continuous visual memory test performance : Hoye, W. E., & Dickson, A. L.

Influence of non-verbal intellectual ability and visuoperceptive skills on continuous visual memory test performance

Influence of non-verbal intellectual ability and visuoperceptive skills on continuous visual memory test performance

The Standard Progressive Matrices: methodological problems associated with the administration of the 1992 adult standardisation sample

The Standard Progressive Matrices [SPM (Raven, Court & Raven, Manual for Raven's Progressive Matrices and Vocabulary Scales, 1992) is commonly used for measuring non-verbal intellectual abilities. Periodically the normative scores have to be revised and new standardisation tests conducted. The most recent standardisation of the adult norms suffers from serious methodological problems associated with the ways in which the test was administered. The most fundamental flaw is that the administration of the test was not supervised and two or more persons could easily have worked jointly on the items (i.e. the subjects could have cheated). Other problems relate to the inordinate length of time (i.e. up to 1 week) that subjects could have theoretically spent on the test and the fact that the range of scores that fall between the 5th and 95th percentile rank is exceptionally narrow. There is also the additional problem that scores obtained during self-administration of the test are not directly comparable with those obtained during individually supervised administration. These factors may result in reasonably high scores obtained during an individually supervised performance being misinterpreted as impaired performance when compared with the normative data. It is recommended that the 1992 adult normative data for the SPM are used cautiously when interpreting the performance score of an individual case.

Relationship between Acculturation, Cognitive Style, and Intelligence

The relationship of degree of Anglo-American acculturation to analytic cognitive style, nonverbal intelligence, and verbal intelligence was investigated using a cross-sectional development design. The results suggest that cognitive style does not play a particularly important role in an individual's performance on intelligence tests. In this study Mexican-Americans were no different from Anglos in nonverbal intellectual ability, but they performed less well on the vocabulary subtest. Overall this suggests that a relatively lower verbal facility, rather than analytic ability or cognitive style, contributed to the poorer performance of Mexican-Americans on standardized verbal intelligence tests. However, when Mexican-Americans become similar to Anglos in acculturation there is no significant difference between the groups on these important reference tests.