Abstract
The intellectual, academic, and adaptive strengths and weaknesses of 30, medication-free children (M=10.5 years) with Tourette syndrome (TS) were assessed with a battery of standardized psychoeducational measures and the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales. Results indicated significant relative weaknesses in mental and written arithmetic, and relative strengths in reading achievement and abstact, logical thinking. Socialization skills emerged as a signifiant weakness in adaptive functioning. Comparisons between TS children with attention deficit disorder with hyperativity (ADD-H) (n=19) and without ADD-H(n=11) pointed to similar profiles of strength and weakness in both groups in all areas assessed, but significantly lower performance IQs in TS subjects with ADD-H. These findings are discussed in relation to future research with TS children.
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The authors wish to thank Robert Hodapp, Ph.D., for his reading of an earlier draft of this manuscript. Sharon Ort, R.N., M.P.H., and Kenneth Towbin, M.D., assisted in the collection of the clinical data. This research was supported, in part, by Boehringer Ingelheim, Ltd., the John Merck Fund, and NIMH grants MH18268 and MH30929.
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Dykens, E., Leckman, J., Riddle, M. et al. Intellectual, academic, and adaptive functioning of Tourette syndrome children with and without attention deficit disorder. J Abnorm Child Psychol 18, 607–615 (1990). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01342750
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01342750