Intelligence Scale for children with visual impairment - professional version: performance by type and degree of disability

Abstract

The objective of this study was the research of the validity of a scale for assessing the intelligence of children with visual impairment. The instrument (Intelligence Scale of visually impaired children - professional version, EPIC-DV) is made up of 29 sentences that evaluate the areas of verbal, logical, quantitative reasoning and memory, which must be judged by a professional within a Likert scale of 5 points, regarding the intensity of the behavior present in the child that has been evaluated. The sample was integrated by 10 professionals from specialized institutions (M = 45.7 years, DP = 13.1) who evaluated 30 visually impaired children, aged between seven and twelve years (M = 9, 76, DP = 1.81), of both sexes and of diferent levels of schooling. Of all these, 8 were acquired deficiency and 22 were of the congenital type, while 23 were diagnosed with low vision and 7 with blindness. The results pointed out that most of the areas evaluated did not show significant diferences between the groups according to the degree of disability. The influence of the variable type of disability was found only for verbal reasoning, with a better performance of those children with congenital deficiency. In general, the results suggest that the EPIC-DV can be used as a complementary follow-up tool, within a broader process and aimed at evaluating the cognitive abilities of children and adolescents with visual impairment, regardless of the grade or type of disability.