An investigation of the use of central auditory tests to identify children with learning disabilities

The purpose of this study was to examine the performances of learning disabled and normal children on the children's and adult's versions of the Pitch Pattern Sequence (PPS) Test, the 460 and 230 msec. versions of the Modified Pitch Pattern Sequence (MPPS) Test and the Sound Mimicry (SM) subtest of the Goldman-Fristoe-Woodcock (G-F-W) Test Battery and to examine correlations among these three instruments. In addition, the possibility that learning disabled children demonstrate more reversals than normal children was explored.Thirty eight subjects ranging in age from eight to 15 years who exhibited normal peripheral hearing and I.Q. scores above 80 were tested. Group A consisted of 20 children who did not appear to have learning disabilities. Group B consisted of 18 children who did appear to have learning disabilities.Results indicated that on the average, learning disabled children performed poorer than normal children on the children's and adult's versions of the PPS and the 460 and 2.30 msec. versions of the MPPS to a statistically significant degree. However, because the scores obtained by the two groups largely overlapped, it was concluded that these two instruments should not be used alone to diagnose learning disabilities. Results also indicated that learning disabled children perform poorer than normal children on the SM subtest of the G-F-W Test Battery. Because the scores obtained by the two groups had less overlap, it was concluded that this test offers the most promise as a test for identifying learning disabilities. However, research is indicated in order to further investigate the presently published norms.Correlations were found to be relatively high among the children's and adult's versions of the PPS and the 460 and 230 versions of the MPPS. However, the SM subtest was not strongly correlated with either the PPS or the MPPS.Finally, results indicated that learning disabled children demonstrate more reversals on the pitch pattern tests to a statistically significant degree. However, in view of overlapping scores between the two groups, it was concluded that the number of reversals is not a reliable means for identifying learning disabilities.Thesis (M.A.