[Learning and performance behavior of MCD children with specific partial performance weaknesses]

Twenty-four children with specific learning difficulties and 23 normal children were given various problem-solving tasks, and the strategies they used to solve the problems were analyzed in terms of information theory. This process-oriented analysis showed that the children with learning disabilities could not solve the convergent thinking tasks using simultaneous strategies but instead needed successive steps. On object-finding tasks they more frequently used a trial-and-error strategy, which they maintained in task repetition even after interactive elaboration of solution-relevant operators (low degree of learning from experience).