Comparison of intelligence in children with autism and controls: Raven's progressive matrices and wechsler intelligence scale-III

Introduction: Intelligence in children with autism has been underestimated for long. Previous studies have reported an uneven performance on intelligence tests. Better performance on Raven's Progressive Matrices (RPM) as compared to Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children and Adults (WISC-III) has been found in some studies. RPM is quick and easy to administer. Hence there is a need to understand if RPM is a comparable test to tap the intelligence in children with autism. Aims and Objectives: To find the percentile IQ scores of children with autism and controls using RPM and WISC and to compare the performance of the two groups using the IQ tests. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional study including 15 children with autism and normal controls was done. The children were subjected to WISC-III and RPM. Results: The study shows that normal children perform better on intelligence tests than children with autism. Both tests can be used to measure intelligence in children with autism fairly owing to their correlation. However, RPM showed better scores than WISC-III for children with autism. Conclusions: Matrices can be used as an alternative and an even better test to measure intelligence in children with autism just as the standard WISC-III. Further studies in a larger population of children with autism are warranted to validate our findings.