Visual Persistence and Information Pick-up in Learning Disabled Children

Abstract

Psychophysical tasks were used to test two possible explanations for the lower spans of apprehension observed for learning disabled subjects by McIntyre, Murray, Coronin, and Blackwell (1978). In Experiment 1, the length of visual persistence was found to be less for LD subjects. In Experiment 2, the rate of information pick-up was found to be slower for LD subjects. Clearly, either or both of these explanations may account for the lowered spans of apprehension observed for LD subjects by McIntyre et al. The implications of these results for the reading difficulties encountered by LD children and for remediation techniques involving saccadic eye movement training are discussed.