ORIGINAL PAPER Verbal and non-verbal intelligence: dyslexic-dysgraphic students and normal students

Introduction: The present research aimed to compare the verbal and nonverbal intelligence of students with dyslexia-dysgraphia and normal students. Material and methods: Thirty students with dyslexia-dysgraphia and 30 students from mainstream schools of grade 3 boy school in Tehran were selected. All subjects were matched by age and IQ. In addition, students of two groups did not show any background in either emotional-behavioral difficulties or visual/audio weakness. The instruments which were used in the research consisted of Dyslexia-Dysgraphia Inventory, Rutter Questionnaire, Raven Test, Reading-Writing Test, WISC, and a Personnel background questionnaire. The data were analyzed by the t-test. Results: The results demonstrated that the verbal intelligence of the dyslexia-dysgraphia group was significantly lower than that of the normal student, while the nonverbal intelligence of the dyslexia-dysgraphia group was significantly higher than that of the other group. In addition, the verbal intelligence was significantly lower than the nonverbal intelligence for the students with dyslexia-dysgraphia. However, this difference was not found for the normal group. Conclusions: This research suggesting that the nonverbal skills of students with dyslexia-dysgraphia may compensate the shortage of students’ verbal intelligence, if this can be well handled by appropriate educational methods.