IQ and Child Psychiatric Disorder

Abstract

The WISC-RIQ scores of 85 children between 7 and 12 years of age taken from the inpatient, outpatient and day care facilities of a Regional Treatment Centre were compared with the expected IQ scores of the standard normal population. In addition, analysis of variance techniques were used to test for an association between IQ variables and seven operationally defined symptom subtypes taken from the child's chart. Significant differences between the clinical sample and the standard normal population were found for the distribution and means for full scale IQ and verbal IQ but not performance IQ. In addition, significant associations were found between FSIQ and the level of aggressive symptoms, and between VIQ and the level of hyperkinetic and aggressive symptom subtypes. The importance of IQ variables and in particular VIQ in understanding the nature of childhood psychiatric disorder is emphasized. The implications of these findings for educational policy are discussed.