Sociometric status and social behaviour of boys with learning disabilities in a special school in Zambia.

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to compare the sociometric status and social behaviour of boys with different subtypes of learning disabilities in a self-contained special school in Zambia. Participants were 112 Zambian boys, who had previously been identified as having a learning disability. Sociometric status and social behaviour were determined by sociometric choice and sociometric behaviour assessments, respectively, whereas subtypes of LD and aggression and attention deficits were determined based on the scores obtained on the WRAT3 and the IOWA-CTRS, respectively. Results showed that there were no significant differences in sociometric status and social behaviour between boys with arithmetic disabilities (AD), reading disabilities (RD), and both arithmetic and reading disabilities (AD/RD). Many children with AD were actually indistinguishable from children with RD, on the basis of peer reports of social behaviour. The results also showed that children whose learning disabilities were accompanied by aggression and/or attention deficits received more negative nominations from their peers than boys without any of these problems. A number of possible explanations for the lack of AD-RD differences in sociometric status and social behaviour in this study are offered. The findings may have been attenuated because of the special school-setting in which all children displayed atypical patterns of development. It was, however, interesting to note that the behavioral correlates of sociometric status appeared to be the same in this setting as those found with normally-achieving children in Western cultures. Implications and limitations of the present study as well as suggestions for future research are discussed.