Diagnosing Attention Disorders With Measures of Neurocognitive Functioning

Abstract

The validity of the Differential Ability Scales (DAS; Elliott, 1990) in predicting attention disorders in school-aged children was examined. The participants were 40 children diagnosed with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and 40 normal children between 7 and 12 years of age. Comorbidity was controlled by excluding children with ADHD who had a concurrent DSM-IV diagnosis such as reading disability, learning disability, mood disorder, or behavioral disorder. In addition, groups did not differ significantly by sex, age, racial/ethnic identification, or parental educational level. A stepwise discriminant analysis indicated the DAS correctly classified 72.5% of the total sample when either the Sequential and Quantitative Reasoning subtest or the Recall of Digits subtest was used to predict group membership. In general, the DAS core subtests were found to be good measures of cognitive ability in children classified with ADHD and did not appear to be influenced by attention problems.

Use of the Differential Ability Scales for children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder.

“…Although the DAS has been found to be a reliable cognitive measure in differentiating children with LD from controls, it has not been found in this investigation to be as robust in differentiating children with ADHD from controls. Some scale score differences were found between samples that were supported by previous research (i.e., Gibney et al, 2002).…”

“…The ADHD group demonstrated a weakness on RDIG and a competency on ROIMM as compared to controls. However, Gibney et al (2002) reported significant group differences on the Nonverbal Reasoning Cluster and the GCA. Although the noted competency in ROIMM was not supported in Gibney's et al study, previous research has found ADHD samples to perform better on visually oriented tasks.…”

“…To date, only one investigation has examined the DAS with children with ADHD. Gibney et al (2002) compared 40 children with ADHD to 40 children without ADHD (7 to 12 years of age) and excluded children with comorbid conditions such as reading disability, learning disability, mood disorder, or behavioral disorder. Participants who did not have ADHD were selected based on their similarity to the ADHD sample in gender, age, racial/ethnic identification, and parental education level.…”

Identifying, Assessing, and Treating ADHD at School

“…Among the measures appropriate for such assessment is the Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processing (CTOPP; Wagner, Torgesen, & Rashotte, 1999). Elliott, 1990) Relative to normal controls, low scores on the Sequential and Quantitative Reasoning, and Recall of Digits subtests (Note: subjects, 63% combined type; Gibney, McIntosh, Dean, & Dunham, 2002).…”

Differential Ability Scales – Second Edition (neuro)psychological predictors of math performance for typical children and Children with Math Disabilities

“…The recently revised Differential Abilities Scales-Second Edition (DAS-II; Elliott, 2007) and its predecessor are popular measures of intellectual and cognitive functioning among school psychology practitioners and have excellent technical qualities (Dumont, Willis, & Sattler, 2001;Elliott, 2007;Platt, Kamphaus, Keltgen, & Gilliland, 1991). The Verbal (Gc), Nonverbal Reasoning (Gf), and Spatial (Gv) abilities factor structure hypothesized for the DAS and DAS-II Core subtests has been validated using large standardization samples (Elliott, 1990(Elliott, , 2007; children with cultural, linguistic, or racial differences (DiCerbo & Barona, 2000;Keith, Quirk, Schartzer, & Elliott, 1999;Riccio, Ross, Boan, Jemison, & Houston, 1997); and children with developmental and learning disabilities (Dumont, Cruse, Price, & Whelley, 1996;Elliott, 2001;Gibney, McIntosh, Dean, & Dunham, 2002;Hughes & McIntosh, 2002;Kercher & Sandoval, 1991;McIntosh & Gridley, 1993;Shapiro, Buckhalt, & Herod, 1995). The structure is also supported by independent exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis (Daleo et al, 1999;Dunham, McIntosh, & Gridley, 2002;Keith, 1990).…”