Predictors of Zimbabwean children’s neuro-cognitive performance on the Detroit Tests of Learning Aptitude fourth edition (DTLA-4): Implications for policy, practice and research

ABSTRACT

Neuro-cognitive performance is important for academic and general achievement in day-to-day life. In settings where children under the age of 18 years constitute close to half the population, yet with no routine child development assessment and intervention in place, it becomes important that factors predicting neuro-cognitive performance among them are identified and the affected aspects specified. This paper provides evidence on Zimbabwean children’s neuro-cognitive performance and the factors predicting it using a locally adapted, validated and normed Detroit Tests of Learning Aptitude fourth edition (DTLA-4). Four hundred and seventy-five school children (6–13 years) participated in the study. School type, grade, attending an urban school and age were independent predictors of overall neuro-cognitive performance. Performance did not differ with gender. Children from disadvantaged communities as depicted by school type were worst affected on items that require crystallised intelligence, cognitive level problem solving and simultaneous processing of information. These findings are important in developing targeted interventions that facilitate neuro-cognitive development and support children in low resource settings. The implications of these findings for policy, practice and research are discussed.

KEYWORDS:

• Neuro-cognitive
• neuropsychological test
• children
• DTLA-4
• disadvantaged communities
• Zimbabwe
• schools
• predictors
• performance

Acknowledgements

Special thanks go to the school children who participated and the research assistants; Farai Mangoro, Shingiray S. Zviuya, Susan Chidakwa and Rutendo Remwa for assisting with the assessments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Tecla Mlambo http://orcid.org/0000-0001-6246-0297

Naomi Dale http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2195-1430

Additional information

Funding

We acknowledge the Southern African Consortium for Research Excellence (SACORE) and Wellcome Trust for funding TM’s PhD studies – grant number 087537/F/08/A, and Pro-ed, the developers of the DTLA-4 for giving us the permission to use their test.