Icon for The Psychological Testing Center of San Francisco

Category: Learning Disabilities

ON FOSTERING RESILIENCE

In a study of female college students 7 out of 10 endorsed having experienced inappropriate sexual touching in their childhood.  Based upon this data, one might expect there to be a colossal incidence of PTSD in these women. However, this study also found that only 2 or 3 of these women felt they suffered enduring psychological repercussions.  In other words, wrong things happen but the event alone does not predict the outcome on one’s psyche.  Many of you will have

Read More »

The College Admissions Scandal: Reflections from an Evaluator

The College Admissions scandal rocked the world of disability testing, with the work product from learning disability evaluators essential to the scam. In this newsletter I offer my reflections on the assessment process and why evaluators must maintain the integrity of the process. I will address several key points: Are parents seeking to game the system? Is slow test-taking always due to a learning disability? Can students expect high test scores if they have high grades? What does it mean

Read More »

What is Dyslexia Really?

Dyslexia is a fundamental deficit in the ability to read efficiently. I cannot emphasize the word efficiently enough, because some people think that dyslexia means a student basically cannot read. I have evaluated over 500 people with dyslexia and of those only one was essentially not able to read (even though he had a very high IQ). First, let’s clarify our terms: dyslexia is the term used in the educational therapy domain to signify a reading deficit. Concurrently, psychologists use

Read More »

Math Disorders

According to the DSM-5 just 2% of students have a Math Disorder, otherwise known as dyscalculia (dys -Latin for, and caulcula ———). We hear so many students claim, “I’m not good at math!” perhaps even a majority of students in high school and college. Thus, it is incumbent upon learning specialists and evaluators to discern the difference between students who: have foundational gaps in their math knowledge and are weaker in math than language arts, from those who have measured

Read More »