Wechsler subscales and social adjustment in childhood and adolescence

Abstract

Subscales of the WISC and WAIS were compared to assessments of social competence and hostility in subjects at risk for psychopathology and in normal subjects to test the hypothesis that Comprehension and Picture Arrangement are socially sensitive subscales. Assessments were made both in childhood (N = 82, N = 62) and in adolescence (N = 125, N = 113). In scaled score comparisons, Picture Arrangement showed a weak association with measures of positive social adjustment relative to other subscales. While Comprehension did correlate significantly with a global assessment of social competence, it was generally not superior in this regard to other Verbal and Performance subscales which also had significant correlations with social competence.;Additional analyses using scatter (deviation) scores on these subscales were performed using analysis of variance. In the normal comparison group, negative scatter on the Comprehension subscale was associated with social adjustment deficits in childhood; positive scatter on the Picture Arrangement subscale was associated with social adjustment deficits in adolescence. Differences were observed in these comparisons between at risk for psychopathology and normal comparison groups and between childhood and adolescent assessments, suggesting that findings in respect to relationships may be expected to vary in different populations and different age groups. Implications for the use of this hypothesis in interpreting Wechsler test protocols are discussed.