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British academics are working to create a computerised testing system to help classify athletes with a learning disability, it has been announced.
The London 2012 Paralympics will be the first time athletes with an intellectual disability have been allowed to compete at an international multi-disability sports event since the 2000 Sydney Paralympics.
Loughborough University researchers led by Dr Stephan Bandelow have so far developed an automated touch screen test. They are currently working with sports scientists in analysing data taken from 700 athletes who used the system during competition and training.
Dr Bandelow said: "The programme tests reaction times, reasoning abilities, memory and concentration and is designed to measure problems with information processing that are prevalent amongst individuals with a learning disability.
"We also aim to develop sport-specific testing for sports including athletics, swimming and table tennis, based on the cognitive demands associated with each discipline."
Medical records, IQ tests and in-competition assessments in addition to psychometric testing will also be used as part of the developing process, a Loughborough spokesman said.
Beth Haller, Ph.D., is Co-Director of the Global Alliance for Disability in Media and Entertainment (www.gadim.org). A former print journalist, she is a member of the Advisory Board for the National Center on Disability and Journalism (https://ncdj.org/). Haller is Professor Emerita in the Department of Mass Communication at Towson University in Maryland, USA. Haller is co-editor of the 2020 "Routledge Companion to Disability and Media" (with Gerard Goggin of University of Sydney & Katie Ellis of Curtin University, Australia). She is author of "Representing Disability in an Ableist World: Essays on Mass Media" (Advocado Press, 2010) and the author/editor of Byline of Hope: Collected Newspaper and Magazine Writing of Helen Keller (Advocado Press, 2015). She has been researching disability representation in mass media for 30+ years. She is adjunct faculty in the Disability Studies programs at the City University of New York (CUNY) and the University of Texas-Arlington.
From UKPA:
