A Comparison of Intellectually Superior Male Reading Achievers and Underachievers from a Neuropsychological Perspective.

Abstract

The vast majority of research on intellectually superior underachievers has focused on social, emotional, and family factors. There are theoretical reasons to consider other factors as well. Research with intellectually average underachievers indicates reading problems are often associated with neuropsychological deficits. The present study investigated this relationship for intellectually superior (WISC-R FSIQ (GREATERTHEQ) 120) males. Twenty reading achievers and twenty reading underachievers, controlled for age (8-12), SES, medical history, and emotional problems were compared on a comprehensive battery of neuropsychological tests, including the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised, Token Test, Producing Word Associations (CELF), Auditory Attention Span for Related Syllables (DTLA), Benton Finger Localization Test, Purdue Pegboard, Gardner Reversal Frequency Test, Bender Gestalt Test, and Benton Right-Left Discrimination Test. The results revealed significant (p < .01) global differences; achievers displayed a higher level of overall neuropsychological functioning. Specific analyses also revealed certain significant (p < .05) differences. Underachievers experienced significant difficulty on tests involving the following psychological functions: auditory short-term memory, auditory sequencing, linguistic processing orientation of letters/numbers, and attention/concentration. The latter (e.g., the way attention is deployed) appears to be a major component underlying each function. These relative weaknesses may be interpreted as neuropsychological deficits or a difference in attentional strategies. Each interpretation has different implications in terms of etiology and remediation. Continued research in the field needs to examine the relationship between these weaknesses and the reading process, along with the role other factors (e.g., motivation, SES) may play.