A Modified Lincoln-Oseretsky Motor Development Scale: Provisional Standardization

Abstract

This study was designed to modify the Lincoln-Oseretsky Motor Development Scale into a brief instrument which would be easy to administer and to score and which would yield a set of norms against which to assess motor development/proficiency in deviant children of elementary school age. An earlier (31-item) modification of the Lincoln-Oseretsky (L-O) was administered to 210 essentially normal boys ranging in age from 5 through 11 yr. (K through 6th grade). This led to the provisional standardization of a modified scale (ML-O) of 26 items, arranged in approximate order of difficulty and dependence. In keeping with the objectives of the study, the scale: (a) reflected the developmental nature of motor proficiency, (b) demonstrated acceptable reliability and validity, and (c) required a total administration time of under 30 min. This provisional standardization yielded tentative age and percentile norms. Ongoing validation studies indicate that the modified scale discriminates between different clinical populations and the normative group and that it could usefully serve in the identification of neuromotor deviation among children. Future directions for increasing the precision of the norms are suggested.