Abstract:
The Columbia Mental Maturity Scale (CMMS) is an individually-administered test yielding an estimate of the general reasoning ability of children aged 3 years 6 months through 9 years 11 months. It is designed to help educators select curriculum materials and learning tasks for children with special needs or for normal children. Because test items are of the classification type and require no verbal response and only a minimal motor response, the CMMS is suitable for use with children who have cerebral palsy or other brain damage, mental retardation, visual handicaps, speech impairment, hearing loss, or lack of English proficiency. The 92 pictorial and figural classification items are arranged in a series of eight overlapping scales or levels. The child takes the level indicated as appropriate for his chronological age. Fifty-one to sixty-five items are actually presented, depending upon the level being administered. Each item consists of a series of three to five drawings printed on a 6-by-19-inch card. Different colors are used for some of the items to make the pictures more attractive and interesting to children. The objects depicted are, in general, within the range of experience of most American children, even those whose environmental backgrounds have been limited. For each item, the child is asked to look at all the pictures on the card, select the one which is different or unrelated to the others, and indicate his choice by pointing to it. In order to do this, he must formulate a rule for organizing the pictures so as to exclude just one. The bases for discrimination range from the perception of rather gross differences in color, size, or form, to recognition of very subtle relations in pairs of pictures so as to exclude one from the series of drawings. Except for the group of perceptual items at the beginning of the first three levels, no two successive items are based on the same concept or employ exactly the same rule; therefore, each one presents a new and intriguing "puzzle" for the child to solve. The items are arranged in approximate order of difficulty. Administration of the CMMS, which takes approximately 15 to 20 minutes, includes teaching the child the task, using three sample items; presenting the test items included in the level appropriate for his chronological age; and recording his response to each item on the Individual Record Form. Scoring is done by the test administrator, and raw scores are converted to age deviation scores, percentile ranks, stanines, and Maturity Index scores. Split-half reliability across all levels approaches .90 and test-retest reliability is approximately .85. Concurrent validity with the Stanford Achievement Test, the Otis-Lennon Mental Ability Test, and the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Test ranges form the .30s to the .60s. Test norms were established on a sample of 2600 children from across the country.