Validation of the Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children Comparing Anglo and Mexican-American Preschoolers

The concurrent validity of the recently developed Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC) was assessed by comparing it with the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence (WPPSI) using two groups of 30 Anglo and 30 Mexican-American preschoolers as subjects. The correlations between the five K-ABC Scales and the three WPPSI IQs were all positive, most moderately high, with the patterns of high and low relationships very similar for both groups, suggesting that the K-ABC and WPPSI are measuring similar, but not identical, intellectual and achievement factors. No significant differences between the Anglo and Hispanic groups were found for any of the K-ABC scales but the Anglo children scored significantly higher on the WPPSI Verbal IQ than the Hispanics. These results provide evidence that the K-ABC not only has good concurrent validity with the WPPSI but also appears to be a less biased instrument for Mexican-American children.