Minor neurological indicators and developmental function in preschool children

An attempt was made to determine whether neuromaturational indicators (soft neurological signs) were associated consistently with specific areas of developmental function in 5-year-old children. Fifty-eight children were assessed over two diagnostic sessions. One involved administration of the Pediatric Exam of Educational Readiness (PEER) by pediatric fellows; the other consisted of administration of the McCarthy Scales of Children's Abilities (MSCA) by trained psychoeducational specialists. Data indicate that children who exhibited a greater number of minor neurological indicators had a high likelihood of experiencing difficulty with visual-perceptual, fine motor, and gross motor tasks of the PEER and the MSCA. What is more important, no relationship was found between aggregates of minor neurological indicators and performance on linguistic, memory, sequencing, quantitative, verbal, or preacademic sections of these diagnostic instruments. This information suggests that physicians should limit their interpretation of such signs when evaluating young children with academic difficulties. Additional data must be accumulated before the role of neuromaturational signs can be fully understood.