Intellectual Assessment

Intellectual assessment is a fairly sophisticated field, with tools that have been refined for over 100 years. Not all of these tools apply well to early childhood (birth to age 8), but some of them do. There are compelling reasons to assess intellectual functioning during early childhood. Two reasons that are often noted are detecting exceptionalities and allowing empirical research on intellectual development. Exceptionalities may reflect creative potentials or the potential to excel, or they may be indicative of developmental concerns, in which case the intellectual assessment is an important part of a diagnosis. In terms of research, intellectual assessment tools are especially helpful for longitudinal research, and longitudinal research may be the most powerful method for studying development.

This entry reviews the methods for intellectual ...