The impact of adults' communication clarity versus communication deviance on adolescents with learning disabilities

Research has demonstrated that confusing styles of parental communication--"communication deviances" (CD)--are associated with cognitive disorder in offspring. The present study examined the immediate effects of adult communication clarity versus deviance on sixty-one 11- to 15-year-old male and female adolescents with learning disabilities (LD). Subjects were randomly assigned to complete the Rorschach Arrangement Task (RorAT) under conditions of either clear (n = 30) or unclear (n = 31) instructions from an adult. Immediately thereafter, the adolescents were administered a test of abstract thinking--The Twenty Questions Task (TQT). Strategies used to solve the task were assessed. As hypothesized, adolescents in the clear communication condition performed significantly better on the RorAT and used more efficient cognitive strategies on the TQT than did adolescents in the unclear communication condition. A new theory with implications for teaching and parenting is proposed for understanding the influence of adult communication on students with LD.