Intelligence, learning disabilities, and event‐related potentials

Abstract

The current status of research on learning disabilities (LD) and intelligence in children using event‐related potential (ERP) methods is outlined. Consistent with behavioral and psychophysical assessments of sensory capabilities, exogenous sensory ERPs do not show compelling evidence of a relation to measures of either intelligence or LD. With normal adult samples, there is some evidence that higher mental ability is associated with shorter ERP latency on sensory and elementary cognitive discrimination tasks that elicit an endogenous, late positive (P3) ERP wave. Children with reading disabilities (RD) exhibit longer P3 latency and smaller P3 amplitude than normal controls to linguistic target stimuli, but individuals with RD are not differentiated from normal controls on simple sensory discrimination ERP paradigms. The importance of classifying subtypes of LD was evident in several studies. In particular, a fronto‐central negative wave at 450 ms was successful in distinguishing LD subtypes in several paradigms and shows considerable promise for elaborating the neurological bases of LD.