Tactile-perceptual functioning in relation to intellectual, cognitive and reading skills in younger and older normal...

Forty-eight 12- to 14-years-olds and 40 six- to eight-year-old normal boys and girls were distributed into two groups on the basis of the number of errors they made on several tests of tactile-perceptual ability. The groups were then compared on measures of intellectual, cognitive and reading ability. In the older group, children with poor tactile-perceptual skills performed significantly less well on the other measures than children with few tactile-perceptual errors. This relationship was not so clearly demonstrated in the younger groups. The results are discussed in terms of individual differences in brain function.