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Giftedness. Can it be predicted in infancy?
B K Shapiro1, F B Palmer, S E Antell
1Johns Hopkins University Medical Institutions, Baltimore, MD.
Insights
The Bayley Scales of Infant Development (BSID) show small group advantages for gifted children but cannot reliably identify individual infants who will later demonstrate superior cognitive function.
Area of Science:
- Developmental Psychology
- Cognitive Science
- Pediatrics
Background:
- Longitudinal studies are crucial for understanding developmental trajectories.
- Early cognitive assessments aim to identify developmental strengths and potential challenges.
- Intellectual giftedness is defined by high IQ scores, typically above 135.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the predictive validity of the Bayley Scales of Infant Development (BSID) for identifying intellectually gifted children.
- To determine if early BSID performance can accurately forecast later intellectual giftedness at 7.5 years of age.
Main Methods:
- A cohort of 200 children was followed from birth in a longitudinal developmental study.
- Children were assessed periodically, with final intellectual giftedness determined by WISC-R IQ scores (>135) at 7.5 years.
- Discriminant function analysis was employed to predict giftedness based on BSID scores.
Main Results:
- Gifted children walked and spoke earlier on average, showing small but significant group advantages in developmental milestones and early cognitive tests.
- Only two out of 36 gifted children scored above 134 on the BSID, indicating low sensitivity.
- The discriminant function analysis yielded a sensitivity of 0.69 and a specificity of 0.39 for predicting giftedness.
Conclusions:
- While groups of children who later become gifted show higher BSID scores, the BSID is not a reliable tool for identifying individual gifted infants.
- Early developmental assessments require careful interpretation, especially when predicting complex outcomes like intellectual giftedness.
- Further research is needed to develop more accurate methods for early identification of giftedness.
Abstract:
A cohort of 200 children, who were followed from birth and periodically evaluated as part of a longitudinal study of child development, was used to determine the ability of the Bayley Scales of Infant Development (BSID) to predict children who would be considered intellectually gifted at 7.5 years. The cohort was predominantly white (91%), upper middle class (70% in Hollingshead class 1 or 2), and had preschool educational experiences (94%). At outcome, 36 children had WISC-R verbal, performance, or full scale IQs greater than 135 and were called gifted. On average, gifted children walked 0.7 months earlier and spoke two-word sentences 2.2 months earlier than the non-gifted group. As a group, gifted children showed statistically significant, but clinically small, advantages for age of walking, age of speaking two-word sentences, BSID, and Stanford Binet IQ. Of the 36 children who later proved to be gifted, only two had BSID IQs greater than 134. Of the four children who had BSID IQs greater than 134, two maintained their superior function but 2 did not. A discriminant function analysis was used to predict giftedness for individual children based on BSID performance. The resulting classification achieved sensitivity = 0.69 and specificity = 0.39. Although groups of infants who will be gifted have higher BSID scores, the BSID cannot be endorsed as a method of identifying individual infants who will later demonstrate superior cognitive function.