Richard P. Alexander

Cross-modal Matching by Spastic Children

Twenty‐one children with spastic quadraplegia were compared with a reference group of 21 non‐handicapped children, matched for mental age, in within‐and cross‐modal matching of visual and auditory spatio‐temporal patterns. The results failed to support Birch and Belmonts (1965) hypothesis that children with cerebral palsy necessarily suffer from a breakdown of intersensory integration. Rather, the spastic group was equally deficient compared with the reference group in all four matching tasks. It is argued that cross‐modal matching has only limited applicability in the analysis of perceptual deficiencies in those with brain‐damage. More positively, it is suggested that the poorer performance of the spastic group is a function of inexperience in independent mobility. Attention is drawn to methodological issues involved in the assumption that the cerebral palsied have a lower perceptual sensitivity than the non‐handicapped merely because they make fewer correct responses.

Pattern Rate and Interpattern Interval in Development of Matching Simple Auditory-Visual Patterns.

Assessed the possibility that previous failures to find evidence of more rapid inter- than intramodal development of matching of simple auditory and visual patterns have occurred because of the exclusive use of slow patterns and short interpattern intervals. In Exp I 32 1st- and 32 3rd-grade boys were compared in inter- and intramodal matching of fast or slow spatiotemporal patterns with long or short interpattern intervals. In Exp II the same comparisons were made for 32 2nd- and 32 4th-grade boys using temporal patterns. In both studies modality was a within-Ss variable, whereas age, pattern rate, and interpattern interval were between-Ss variables. Results indicate that in Exp I 3 separate indices of sensitivity coincided in indicating a significant effect of pattern rate but not of interpattern interval. The more rapid development of inter- than of intramodal matching for fast but not for slow patterns provided support for the hypothesis that auditory-visual integration increases with age at least in boys. In Exp II there was no indication of differential inter- and intramodal development under any condition. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2006 APA, all rights reserved).