Interpretation of pictorially presented social situations by learning disabled and normal children

The Interpretation of Emotion from Facial Expression for Children with Visual Processing Problems

A significant proportion of people with learning difficulties have social problems, which are often considered to be the product of school failure. However, a number of studies have suggested that these social skill problems may relate to the inability to decode subtle visual cues of body language and facial expression. The majority of studies of facial expression, however, have viewed learning disability as a unitary condition, without taking account of specific sub‐types which may have more difficulty in processing visual cues, especially for facial emotion. This study investigated children aged 8 to 12 years who were divided into three learning disability sub‐groups: 1) a visual‐perceptual sub‐type called Irlen Syndrome (n=41); 2) a group with learning disabilities, but no indications of Irlen Syndrome (n=30); and 3) a normally achieving control group (n=31). The Irlen Syndrome sub‐group had significantly lower scores for interpreting emotion from facial expression than the two other groups. The learning disabled non‐lrlen sub‐group also had significantly lower scores than the control group, but with much smaller levels of significance than those between the Irlen and control groups.

Social information processing, security of attachment, and emotion regulation in children with learning disabilities

This study examined the contribution of attachment security and emotion regulation (ER) to the explanation of social information processing (SIP) in middle childhood boys with learning disabilities (LD) and without LD matched on age and grade level. Children analyzed four social vignettes using Dodge's SIP model and completed the Kerns security scale and the children's self-control scale. Study results demonstrated major difficulties in SIP, lower attachment security, and less ER in children with LD compared to children without LD. Attachment as well as the interaction between attachment and ER emerged as important contributors to most SIP steps, suggesting that children with higher security who also have better ER skills will have better SIP capabilities along the different steps, beyond group inclusion. Results were discussed in terms of practical and clinical implications regarding the importance of mother-child attachment and ER skills for social cognitive capabilities in children with LD.

Right hemisphere brain morphology, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) subtype, and social comprehension

Social comprehension involves empathy for others' experiences and appropriate responses to nonverbal cues. Previous research using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has suggested a relationship between brain morphology and psychiatric syndromes, such as attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), that typically entail social difficulties. The right hemisphere, specifically, has been associated with social skill deficits, and numerous studies have also associated ADHD with social skill deficits. No studies, however, have examined the association of ADHD subtype with both social comprehension and right-hemisphere morphology. Fifty-nine children (6-12 years old) underwent MRI, from which the right hemisphere was classified into four morphologic subtypes. Children were also grouped by ADHD subtype or clinical control status. From Behavior Assessment System for Children (BASC) items, a social comprehension subscale was constructed. Analyses revealed significant differences in social comprehension based on ADHD subtype. Differences in social comprehension based on ADHD status were especially pronounced in children with atypical right-hemisphere morphology. Thus, the diagnosis of ADHD might be associated with underlying risk in the area of social comprehension, especially for children with atypical right-hemisphere morphology.

Social information processing and emotional understanding in children with LD

The present study aimed to comprehensively examine social cognition processes in children with and without learning disabilities (LD), focusing on social information processing (SIP) and complex emotional understanding capabilities such as understanding complex, mixed, and hidden emotions. Participants were 50 children with LD (age range 9.4-12.7; 35 boys, 15 girls) and 50 children without LD matched on grade, age, and gender. Children analyzed 4 social vignettes using Dodge's SIP model and completed 2 emotional recognition tasks (pictures and stories) and 4 emotional knowledge tasks, such as providing definitions and examples for 5 emotions (e.g., loneliness, pride, embarrassment). Study results demonstrated that children with LD had major difficulties in SIP processes and consistent difficulties with the different tasks in the understanding of complex emotions and in higher emotional understanding capabilities, such as understanding that 2 conflicting emotions (love and hate) can be simultaneously experienced. We discuss the implications of such difficulties for the understanding of social competence in children with LD as well as their implications for social skills intervention.

Stimulus gender and emotional difficulty level: their effect on recognition of facial expressions of affect in children with and without LD

The ability to recognize emotions that were easily identifiable and those that were more difficult to identify, as expressed by male and female faces, was studied in 48 nondisabled children and 76 children with learning disabilities (LD) ages 9 through 12. On the basis of their performance on the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test and the Benton Visual Retention Test, the LD group was divided into three subgroups: those with verbal (VD), nonverbal (NVD), and both verbal and nonverbal (BD) deficits. A shortened version of Ekman and Friesen's Pictures of Facial Affect, including pictures of both men and women, was the measure of ability to identify facial expressions of affect. Children of both genders in all three groups of children with LD, as well as their normally achieving peers, were more accurate in identifying expressions of affect from female faces, notwithstanding differences in sensitivity to such emotional communication in favor of the nondisabled and VD groups. However, a significant interaction was found between gender and emotional recognition difficulty level, with female faces being more expressive for emotions that were difficult to recognize.

Interpretation of facial expressions of affect in children with learning disabilities with verbal or nonverbal deficits

The ability to identify facial expressions of happiness, sadness, anger, surprise,fear, and disgust was studied in 48 nondisabled children and 76 children with learning disabilities aged 9 through 12. On the basis of their performance on the Rey Auditory-Verbal Learning Test and the Benton Visual Retention Test, the LD group was divided into three subgroups: those with verbal deficits (VD), nonverbal deficits (NVD), and both verbal and nonverbal (BD) deficits. The measure of ability to interpret facial expressions of affect was a shortened version of Ekman and Friesen's Pictures of Facial Affect. Overall, the nondisabled group had better interpretive ability than the three learning disabled groups and the VD group had better ability than the NVD and BD groups. Although the identification level of the nondisabled group differed from that of the VD group only for surprise, it was superior to that of the NVD and BD groups for four of the six emotions. Happiness was the easiest to identify, and the remaining emotions in ascending order of difficulty were anger, surprise, sadness, fear, and disgust. Older subjects did better than younger ones only for fear and disgust, and boys and girls did not differ in interpretive ability. These findings are discussed in terms of the need to take note of the heterogeneity of the learning disabled population and the particular vulnerability to social imperception of children with nonverbal deficits.

Nonverbal learning disability, school behavior, and dyslexia

The aims of the study were to investigate whether children showing a low nonverbal/high verbal (LNV) WISC-R profile are more likely to exhibit behaviors conducive to school failure than children with a low verbal/high nonverbal (LV) profile, and to examine the relationships among these behaviors, the LNV/LV profiles, and reading ability. The 65 subjects included 27 LNV and 38 LV children, aged 5 to 11 years. Results confirmed earlier findings (Badian 1986) that LNV children are perceived by their teachers as significantly poorer than LV children in many behaviors associated with school success. There was a dichotomy, however, between LNV good and poor readers. All LNV subjects displayed problems in organizational skills, but those who were dyslexic were poorer in social behavior (e.g., acceptance of criticism and peer relationships) than either LNV good readers or LV good or poor readers. It was concluded that children with a low nonverbal/high verbal profile and a probable right hemisphere dysfunction, who appear to be dyslexic in the early school years, are at high risk for both social behavior problems and school failure, and that these children are a more high-risk group than poor readers with a low verbal/high nonverbal profile.

Effects of viewing aggressive cartoons on the behavior of learning disabled children

Forty-six learning disabled children (M = 7.6 years) were exposed to six aggressive and six control cartoons in school. Treatment effects were assessed using direct observations of five categories of social behavior. There were no main effects for condition, and neither initial aggressiveness nor gender interacted significantly with condition for any of the behaviors. There was a significant interaction of condition with IQ: the low IQ group became significantly more physically aggressive following control compared with aggressive cartoons. The results from the present study are compared with the findings from other field experiments, and their clinical relevance is discussed.

Social skills assessment and training for the learning disabled: who's on first and what's on second? Part I

This month's Topical Review is the first in a two-part series on the social skills of learning disabled children. In a field traditionally dominated by concerns about intellectual functioning, concern for the development of social skills in LD children has been sparked by data showing that skill deficiencies in this area are associated with poor long-term adjustment and success both in and out of the classroom. This two-part Review presents information about the social skills deficits of LD children, methods for assessing social skills, and treatment programs designed to ameliorate weaknesses in social skills. The first two of these topics are covered this month, while the last topic will be addressed in the next issue.--J.K.T.