The Relationship between Sensorimotor Development and Communication in the Young Severely Handicapped Child. Final Report

The report describes the development and field testing of the Early Social-Communication Scales (ESCS), a measure intended to reflect developmental dimensions of the at-risk infant's and toddler's adaptive interactions. The ESCS was designed to assess three major communicative functions (social interaction, joint attention, and behavior regulation) and to be conceptually linked to the sensorimotor/cognitive stage model. Results revealed substantial validation from the cross-sectional data analysis in conjunction with an adapted version of the Uzgiris-Hunt Scales. The social and cognitive measures were found to be relatively independent of such non-cognitive factors as age and level of motor development. It is asserted that such a model can be used to predict learning readiness. (CL)