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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]You can't look at the speech test scores in isolation.  You need to view them in the context of IQ scores.  A kid who has a speech test score of 85 but an IQ of 120 has a greater than 2 std deviation difference.  That is a concern.  A kid who has an 85 speech test score and a 100 IQ score is not something to be concerned about.

Similarly, you need to compare subscores gaps of more than 1 std deviation(either 3 pts on 10+ scale or 15 on 100+ scale).  So receptive scores at 120 and expressive scores of 85 are troubling.[/quote]

I've never heard anyone suggest comparing iq scores to speech Eval scores to "put them in context". To the SLPs on this thread, is that really at all a relevant thing to do?
Over and over again I've read that speech skills are unrelated to intelligence, so using iq as a way to gauge expressive language delays would be as useful as using the time on a 100 meter dash to gauge it.  They're two totally different skills and you can be brilliant, a fast runner, and extremely articulate, or any combination.[/quote]

You are correct, and comparing scores on an IQ test and a language test is comparing apples and oranges. Using them for context is an outdated practice, but since the tests are not normed the same and designed to be compared, it's outside of the test parameters. It can even be difficult to compare different language tests-they are designed differently and use different methodology to give information about language ability. Single word vocabulary vs paragraph comprehension vs following multistep directions with increasing cognitive load...That's why SLPs are trained in assessment and the best ones use a variety of structured and unstructured assessment tasks to provide a comprehensive view of a person's language, rather than a cookie cutter approach that involves the same test every time.

We do pay more attention to gaps in receptive and expressive language IF one is average and the other is not, but receptive will almost always be (and generally should be) higher than expressive language. Our brains are capable of understanding more in context than we are able to generate, and I have seen some confusion by parents who want them to be equal. This can be the case, but more often than not it isn't. If a receptive score is a few points lower it's likely that the true score (the 90% confidence that was mentioned in an earlier post) is within a range that overlaps the true score of the expressive language. If receptive language is significantly below expressive language, that is a pattern seen most often in ASD. Not always, but most often. All of that to say, a receptive score of 120 and an expressive score of 85 still indicates that a person has average expressive language skills and above average receptive language. They are looking at different skillsets and indicate a relative strength in receptive language, not a relative weakness in expressive language.[/quote]

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