Visual processing speed and video gaming

[moominmamma]

Okay, ds14 (who has since turned 15) had an assessment earlier this fall because he had entered school, struggles with dysgraphia and we wanted him to get the official okay to use a computer for his written work, even in standardized exam situations where it's not normally an option. He had a WISC-IV and some sort of learning styles analysis. 

Overall he was found to be moderately gifted (FSIQ 130) with "achievement scores in writing which are not congruent with his demonstrated cognitive ability." In overall written language skills he performed in the average range, but it was acknowledged that this represents a significant weakness relative to his cognitive abilities. (He also had an OT assessment which confirmed the diagnosis of moderately severe dysgraphia.) His nonverbal scores exceeded his verbal by about 10 points. None of this comes as any surprise to me.

What did surprise me was that his visual processing speed is on the 13th percentile. This seems particularly odd to me in light of the fact that he seems exceptionally adept at quickly performing all sorts of complex 3D mapping using computer algorithms and scripts (he builds maps and levels for various computer games), and is incredibly capable as a computer gamer, especially in complex real-time strategy and first-person-shooter multi-player games. He's part of an adult gaming club with all these very dedicated gaming geeks who spend hours and hours a week honing their skills, and he regularly comes out on top in games, second or third at the very worst. I guess I'm just trying to figure out how someone with such a profound relative weakness in visual processing speed could excel in tasks that seem to me to require lightning-fast visual processing. Clearly there's something I'm not understanding about the nature of processing speed....

The bottom line is that he's thriving in school, is happy and appropriately challenged, has a good self-concept, and doesn't seem to have any difficulties given that he can now use his laptop for written work. He has some anxiety, but honestly it's much much better this fall since he started school. So if there's a learning disability causing the discrepancy in scores, it might be the obstacle that's causing him to be appropriately challenged in 10th and 11th grade classes, and I wouldn't change a thing. 

I'm just kind of wanting to understand the report a bit better. Can anyone help me figure this out?

Miranda

[Roar]

Yes, I agree he's older and if he's doing well in school you have nothing to be concerned about.

Was the visual processing score from the WISC IV or some other testing? If it was the WISC IV find out what subtests are involved in the visual processing speed. As you know a lot about how he learns just reading a brief description of the tests may make it clear. I may be wrong about this but I remember in the past maybe tests like coding and symbol search are included. Coding involves copying down images which of course would be a problem for a lot of students with handwriting challenges.

[moominmamma]

Coding and symbol search, you're right, that's what they used. And he scored the same on both (raw: 7, percentile 13th). Coding is written, but symbol search isn't I don't think. So his score is depressed in either case. Still a mystery....

Miranda 

[RiverTam]

Some gifted people do very poorly on coding because they try to do it perfectly, rather than quickly.

I took one as a guinea pig for a friend in grad school. If I remember right, the instructions don't tell you to go as quickly as you can. They don't tell you it's a speed test. (My coding score was god-awful. I was trying not to make any errors, not go as quickly as I could. My visual coding speed is actually pretty good. I'm a champion Set player.)

[moominmamma]

It occurred to me while lying in bed last night that a visual processing speed that's more than 4 standard deviations away from his nonverbal reasoning score completely explains the fact that he can intuit his way to an almost perfect performance of a Mozart string quartet viola line whilst playing amongst a quartet and getting predictive clues from the sound of the music, but cannot for the life of him sight-read the same example on his own. His pure sight reading skills in music are an immense struggle, lagging years behind his general musical and technical skills -- and they've been a huge source of frustration to him. Now that I think about it, the visual processing speed score makes total sense of that.

Miranda

[moominmamma]

double post

[moominmamma]

Oh, and I also wonder, since he doesn't seem to have any difficulty with keyboarding or fine motor control and can in fact write quite neatly but only at glacial speed, if his dysgraphia might be related to his slow visual processing. It would be interesting to see how he would do with some handwriting practice that required him to not look at what he was writing, to instead work on internalizing the purely motor memory.

Miranda 

(feeling a few puzzle pieces falling into place)

[Roar]

River Tam raises a good point about gifted learners sometimes tanking coding because they are being cautious and trying to do it perfectly. As a homeschooler your son probably hasn't internalized the racing mentality that you get from years of timed tests and so forth. So, that could be factor.

I'm curious Miranda - when did he learn to read and did he have any difficulty with puzzles when he was younger?

[moominmamma]

He learned to read at 5. Much later than his sisters (they were 3.25, 4.0 and 3.5), but not particularly late. He didn't seem to have any particular difficulty with jigsaw puzzles though he had little interest in them and we honestly didn't have them around much so it's hard to say. I always thought of him as a pretty strongly visual-spatial guy. He does all this computer mapping, he's excellent at graphic design, colour and form balance, and all that. He does some amazing digital artwork. But none of these things depend on speed.

The more I think about it, if I had to come up with one skill that relies almost entirely on visual processing speed as I understand it, I'd choose music sight-reading. Cold, in time, with no previous exposure to the sound or harmonic context: because the beat marches forward whether you've decoded the symbols or not. And it's a skill where he simply flounders. Despite working really hard to remediate his difficulties, and waiting for it to "click" for the past five years or so, he's still years and years "behind" by traditional measures, though his other skills allow him to cover for his weakness to a great extent. 

Miranda

[moominmamma]

About the timing element ... he hasn't done years of timed written tests, though he has done some. But he does play lots of race / time-limited computer games and seems to do fine with them. He also did exceptionally well on the tests that required him to "name all the ___(category)___ that you can think of in 30 seconds" or whatever. And surprisingly fine (96th percentile) on the timed written persuasive essay which was part of the WIAT. 

Miranda

Edited by moominmamma - 12/7/11 at 12:45pm

[Roar]

You may be on something.... and I hate to mess your theory but here goes. Our son also tanked coding - totally at odds with his other scores. He's strong as a visual thinker but clearly struggles with visual processing and is not fast when it comes to moving objects in real life or on the screen. But, music sight reading has always been a strength and he's good at fast visual games like SET that don't involve moving objects. I'm guessing there are lots of elements of visual processing and all the WISC can really tell us is "heads up maybe a problem here" rather than giving a lot of specifics.

[moominmamma]

Originally Posted by Roar 

But, music sight reading has always been a strength and he's good at fast visual games like SET that don't involve moving objects. I'm guessing there are lots of elements of visual processing and all the WISC can really tell us is "heads up maybe a problem here" rather than giving a lot of specifics.

That's so interesting!

Whereas my ds does well with moving 3D objects, but struggles with processing stationary ones. 

Miranda

[FarmerBeth]

Originally Posted by moominmamma 

It occurred to me while lying in bed last night that a visual processing speed that's more than 4 standard deviations away from his nonverbal reasoning score completely explains the fact that he can intuit his way to an almost perfect performance of a Mozart string quartet viola line whilst playing amongst a quartet and getting predictive clues from the sound of the music, but cannot for the life of him sight-read the same example on his own. His pure sight reading skills in music are an immense struggle, lagging years behind his general musical and technical skills -- and they've been a huge source of frustration to him. Now that I think about it, the visual processing speed score makes total sense of that.

Miranda

I could write about the same thing about myself as your son, so many times over.  My original university studies and early career was in music, I had the same sight reading issues as your son (fine when in orchestra) and had to work hard to overcome them.  I also had the same total IQ score and a deficit in the same area (although I can't tell from your post what his verbal scores are like, I had a pretty big discrepancy between verbal and performance IQ).  I was considered to have a nonverbal learning disability with the primary difficulty being in visual processing.  I also had great coordination as a musician and fiber artist and terrible difficulty with handwriting.  My take on it is that it doesn't much matter if it qualifies as a learning disability seeing as he's thriving and "appropriately challenged" as you say.  I find that I learned to have good study habits, concentration and resilience when things didn't go smoothly.  I find this also to be true with my 2E child (on the autism spectrum, very mathematically gifted) compared to my "just" gifted DD. 

[joensally]

Have you had his vision checked by a developmental optometrist or opthalmologist with some agreement re developmental optometry (IME, there's quite a bit of rub between the professions)?  DS passed a regular eye exam, but was later diagnosed with a vision issue (by both a dev opt and an opthalmologist).  It was very clear that it had an effect in some of the sub-tests.

Also, have you seen this:

http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/About_GDC/whoaregiftd.htm

We just had DD tested and they insisted on using the SB5 as they're not as confident that the WISC was the optimal tool.  I'm not clear on this as the WISC has extended norms, but the WISC IV has doubled the value of processing speed and working memory in the FSIQ, which works against a lot of gifted kids in terms of reflecting their scores in areas that are believed to have higher g value.

You may also be interested in:

http://www.nognz.com/coordination-1/visual-perception.html

[Roar]

The fact that the GDC still used the LM which is a totally out of date and not secured test makes me question the quality of any research or opinions that they publish about testing.

[joensally]

Originally Posted by Roar 

The fact that the GDC still used the LM which is a totally out of date and not secured test makes me question the quality of any research or opinions that they publish about testing.

How about this from NAGC?

http://www.nagc.org/index.aspx?id=2455

I'm not sure from what moominmama's sharing that FSIQ should have been calculated because it sounds like there are statistically significant discrepancies between scores.  Did they do a GAI?

[moominmamma]

No, they didn't do a GAI, but based on the link you provided and the subtest scores they listed on his report I was able to work it out for myself at 146. For what that's worth -- it's not like he could qualify for any special educational options based on his IQ. But that is a number that's considerably closer to his sister's FSIQ score. My feeling (and hers!) has always been that he is easily her intellectual match, despite some issues which occasionally block his performance in specific areas.

Miranda

[joensally]

Originally Posted by moominmamma 

No, they didn't do a GAI, but based on the link you provided and the subtest scores they listed on his report I was able to work it out for myself at 146. For what that's worth -- it's not like he could qualify for any special educational options based on his IQ. But that is a number that's considerably closer to his sister's FSIQ score. My feeling (and hers!) has always been that he is easily her intellectual match, despite some issues which occasionally block his performance in specific areas.

Miranda

Do you mean there are no special educational options available at all?

My understanding is that extended norms and GAI instructions from the publisher of the tests were released after the WISC IV was released.  So some psychs may not be aware of either protocols.  The SD psych probably won't restate another clinician's data, but you could ask the tester to calculate it (if you did it privately; otherwise the school psych should do it).  It's a better measure of overall "potential" unhampered by processing issues.  It's really interesting to me that the FSIQ formula for the WISC IV increased the weighting of PSI and WMI from previous versions.

[Roar]

Originally Posted by joensally 

How about this from NAGC?

http://www.nagc.org/index.aspx?id=2455

I'm without a lot of time or coffee this morning (and that's a bad combination!)  But, do you read the GDC and NAGC links as saying the same thing? I really don't. To me it seems like a positive thing that moomin's son was given coding and symbol search as those scores are helping her better understand that he may have some visual processing challenges. Yes, it is good for her to look at the GAI, but it seems like a positive thing that she has the processing information.

Again, no coffee.... Does the GDC use the WISC IV at all?

[moominmamma]

Originally Posted by joensally 

Do you mean there are no special educational options available at all?

Not really, as they're commonly understood. This is a school with fewer than 100 students from 4-year-olds to 18-year-olds. There are 8 teachers covering every subject from K-12. My ds has four students in his Grade 10 class, two of whom are significantly learning disabled, the other is moving away in January. We are almost an hour's drive from the next nearest school along lonely winding mountain highways that no one wishes to drive in the winter. The entire district is small: about 600 students. So, needless to say there are no congregated gifted classes, no pull-outs, no visiting gifted specialist teachers.

But ... every teacher in the school knows every student very well. The faculty and staff are innovative and open-minded, no one cares about rules and regulations when they don't optimally serve particular students, so it's almost as if every kid ends up with an unofficial IEP. Ds is already getting amazing accommodations, and this was long before the testing: advanced courses, no need for pre-requisites, time off for music studies, able to use a laptop in all classes, he was given administrative privileges to become the school's on-site computer network technician, does self-paced independent study work through courses where the in-class pace is not optimal for him, has customized self-study courses, gets credit for out-of-school learning experiences, etc.. He has the option to take university credits through the school's Facilitated Learning Centre.

So there's really nothing additional that having a GAI of 146 on his record rather than a FSIQ of 130 is going to give him. He's already getting a completely individualized education program, is happy and challenged, and there's really nothing else that is possible within our remote rural context that I think would benefit him.

Miranda