Social Maturity and Intelligence

Abstract

A comparison was made between K-WISC subtests and Vineland Social Maturity Scale to confirm the feasibility of K-WISC as an index of social competence, particularly the Picture Arrangement subtest. Subjects were 34 child psychiatry patients who were not classified as mental retards or brain damaged. Social Maturity Scale score correlated most highly with Vocabulary subtest score, FSIQ and VIQ while showed lowest correlations with Digit Span and Pitcture Completion subtests. Picture Arrangement subtest correlated with Social Maturity Scale at .05 level of significance, while it did not significantly correlate with Comprehension subtest which was assumed to reflect social intelligence. Therefore, it is doubtful that Picture Arrangement subtest can reflect social competence or social intelligence validly in the sense of the adaptive behavior measured by the Vineland Social Maturity Scale. Further research regarding Social Maturity Scale is needed with IQ constant to see how it can be used helpfully to determine social competence of mentally retarded or brain damaged children.