Congnitive, Self-Concept, and Body Image Measures of Normal, Cleft Palate, and Obsese Adolescents

Abstract

Using discriminant function analyses, this study attempted to establish linear combinations of variables that would identify group membership correctly. Groups of normal (N = 100), cleft palate (N = 51), and obese (N =, 22) adolescents responded to measures of cognitive style and structure, body image, and self-concept. Linear combinations of cognitive measures were not effective in differentiating group membership. Body image measures, in combination, clearly distinguished obese adolescents from the other two groups. A linear combination of self—concept measures differentiated adolescents with clefts from normals, with the former group having a pattern of higher self—esteem and lower perceived acceptability by their parents. Previous research on cleft palate children has been fragmented and restrictive in approach. Differences on psychosocial variables between children with clefts and control populations have been small and inconsistent. Such psychological differences as do exist may be subtle and complex in nature (Clifford, In press). The data reported here were collected as part of a larger study designed to explore the interaction between cleft palate and cognitive organization as they jointly affect self—con-cepts and body images. It was assumed that the person's unique organization of reality, i.e., his thinking processes and thought orga— nization, combined with a symptom, such as cleft palate, would affect the person's estimation of himself and his concepts of his body and its functioning. Further, in order to de— termine whether the posited effects were unique to cleft palate, normal adolescents and adolescents who were grossly obese were in— cluded.