Understanding Patterns of Ability and Disability

A/Prof Murray Dyck, Curtin University
Dr Mike Anderson, University of Western Australia
A/Prof Joachim Hallmayer, Stanford University
Prof David Hay, Curtin University
A/Prof Jan Piek, Curtin University

Researchers on this project are trying to learn more about how a child’s abilities in one area (like solving puzzles) are related to the child’s abilities in another area (like threading a needle). The intention is to learn more about how a disability in one area of a child’s development may be related to the rate at which other abilities develop. If a child has a disability in one area, is it that the child’s other abilities will also be affected? It’s important to know much more about the exact patterns of disability that affect our children. The project involves testing hundreds of boys and girls who have been identified as having a developmental disability, attentional problems, or coordination problems. The testing consists of a large number of separate activities, everything from trying to recognise what emotions are being expressed in pictures or sounds, to assembling blocks to look like designs in a picture, to throwing a ball.