Cognitive patterns and learning disabilities of cleft palate children with verbal deficits

This study examined patterns of cognitive ability in 57 cleft lip ad palate children withh verbal deficit, but without general intellectual retardation. The question to be evaluated was whether the verbal disability displayed by these children was related primarily to a specific verbal expression deficit or a more general symbolic mediation problem. Two groups of children were identified on the basis of performance on cognitive tasks which require verbal mediation strategies without requiring vocal responses. The children wit only a verbal expression problem performed significantly better on tasks requiring categorization and associative reasoning, although there were few apparent differences on memory items. Those children with a verbal expression deficit displayed both an underlying symbolic mediation deficiency and learning disabilities. There was a higher proportion of cleft-palate only children in the more severe group.