THE WECHSLER SCALE AS AN INSTRUMENT TO DIAGNOSE INTELLECTUAL DISABILITY

Intellectual Disability is a disability characterized by significant limitations in intellectual functioning and adaptive behavior; it begins before the age of 18, and yields below-average Intellectual Coefficient scores. Intelligence tests have proven to be the best method for predicting school performance; they can provide useful information to assess intellectual capacity and other abilities. The Wechsler Scale is a test of individual administration that allows the comprehensive assessment of intelligence from 2 to 90 years of age; its result is a set of four composite scores and the total IQ (IQ). The present study was carried out with students who present special educational needs and attend the Unit of Psycho-pedagogical Diagnosis Research and Inclusion Support (UDIPSAI for its acronym in Spanish) of the Catholic University of Cuenca (Ecuador). The objective was to evaluate the intellectual capacity of these students, aged between 3 and 18 years, giving a result of 284 students diagnosed with intellectual disability according to the Wechsler Scale. A correlational descriptive study was carried out and the scales for the population of Cuenca, Ecuador were established, with a total sample of 1262 students from pre-, elementary, and high school. The statistical program SPSS v.23 was used to analyze the data. The analysis of the results concludes that the Wechsler scales provide relevant information about the intellectual functioning and its clinical usefulness of evaluation in the diagnosis.