ESTIMATION OF MOTOR AND COGNITIVE FUNCTIONING IN PERSONS WITH CEREBRAL PALSY AND PERSONS WITH MILD MENTAL RETARDATION

Abstract

The development of special education and reha­bilita­tion provided significant corrections in the methodo­logical approach of the work with dis­abled children and adolescents. This brought changes in the classical and the traditional point of view of their education and rehabilitation.
The traditional approach classifies disabled chil­dren in specific categories. Basically, children be­longing to the same category are very similar, e.g. they have more similarities than differences. The newest re­search in the special education and reha­bilitation shows that children belonging to the same category, mutually differ more, and the group by itself is het­erogeneous. This knowledge brought significant change in the methodological approach of the work with disabled children and adolescents.

The goal of our research in this field is to develop and to define methodology for estimation of the residual abilities in persons with disabilities. Based on this estimation individual programs for educa­tion and rehabilitation will be prepared. The par­ticular goal in this research is to estimate residual abilities in persons with cerebral palsy disability and persons with mild mental retardation.
In total, sixty-five persons from both genders were included in the research. The first group contained 45 persons with mild mental retardation (MMR), and the second group contained 20 persons having cerebral palsy (CP).
For the research purposes, Protocol for estimation of motor and cognitive functioning in social envi­ronment consisting of general and specific part was prepared.
In the general part, the general information as: first name, last name, gender, birth date, place of birth, class, diagnosis first year of education are gath­ered.
The specific part of the Protocol is composed on such a way to provide estimation of the motor and cognitive functioning of the persons in social envi­ronment. Based on chosen tests and battery of tests it is possible to come up to valid data for testing of given paradigms. Estimation of children with CP and MMR is conducted in the following fields of motor and cognitive functioning: general motor ability, vision-motor coordination, constructive praxis, body image, visual perception, orientation, alertness, memory, education, language and speech.
Based on the analysis of the results in children with CP and adolescents it can be observed signifi­cant statistic decrease in the results compared with the maximum of all tested parameters. The conclu­sion to be drawn is that CP is joined with simulta­neous deficit in the field of motor and cognitive functioning.
The tests in mild mentally retarded children and adolescents indicated significant statistic decrease in the results compared with the peak results at all tested parameters.

The conclusion is that cognitive deficit in MMR children and adolescents brings deficit in the motor behaviour, too.
With comparison of the average results among the tested groups, we get the difference in specific fields of motor and cognitive functioning of these persons. (General motor ability, vision-motor co­ordination, constructive praxis, visual perception and feeling of the climate), which is consequence of action of the basic factor, e.g. belonging to spe­cific group. At the same time, in specific number of fields in the cognitive functioning of persons with CP and MMR persons, there is no significant statistic difference among the tested groups (alert­ness, speech, language, body image, visual per­ception - multiple items, orientation in space). Based on the obtained results from the research one can conclude that there is no significant statis­tical difference among the tested groups in all fields of motor and cognitive functioning. Motor and cognitive functioning in persons with CP and persons with MMR is determined from the action of two independent factors. The first factor is the group belonging, and the second factor is type of the task. Motor and cognitive deficits are limitation factors that determine the type and contents of the education and the rehabilitation of these persons. The programs for education and rehabilitation have to be based on the specific organization of these abilities and have to follow and increase their de­velopment.