The validity of the developmental test of visual-motor integration in a selected pre-school sample in the South African context

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT:Visual-motor integration is an important neuro-psychological aspect of school readiness.Developmental deficits in this area can have a detrimental influence on a child's ability tomaster reading, writing and arithmetic skills at school entrance level. Visual-motorintegration problems should therefore be detected as early as possible to be able toimplement intervention strategies which will promote visual-motor development. Thestudy is socially relevant as it corresponds with the South African school policy whichchanged to a more integrative, inclusive approach after 1994.The American standardised Beery Developmental Test for Visual-Motor Integration(VMI) is widely used as a screening technique for visual-motor abilities by psychologists,occupational therapists, educators and remedial teachers in South Africa. In order todetermine the predictive validity of the American VMI for a group of South Africansubjects, the results of children on the VMI: 1989-norms and VMI: 1997-norms werecompared to their results in the Copying Test of the Junior South African IndividualScales (JSAIS). Performance on these three tests were also compared with certainbiographical variables as well as teacher ratings of specific academic skills. Arepresentative sample of 238 pre-school children from the Stellenbosch region wereselected.According to the obtained results, a significant relationship was found between the resultsof the VMI: 1989 and VMI: 1997. The results of both the VMI: 1989 and VMI: 1997correlated significantly with the results of the Copying Test. Performance in the testscorrelated with chronological age, socio-economic status, as well as teacher ratings ofspecific academic skills. The discrepancy between the test performance of the threeethnic groups, suggests that the rate of the perceptual motor development described bythe VMI developmental norms may be culture-specific.Considering the overall results of this study, the interchangeability of the Copying Testand the VMI, especially the VMI: 1997, in clinical use is acceptable in the South Africancontext. The Developmental Test of Visual-Motor Integration thus offers significantpredictive validity, as well as a valid indication, of the visual-motor integrationdevelopment in the sample ofpre-schoolers used.

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University