I see a perfect portrait of my devilish little dickens. She sees Snoopy and Lucy. To understand the visual stimulus overselectivity at work here and for tips on coping with it, scroll down.

What is Visual Stimulus Overselectivity?

When a child with visual stimulus overselectivity (which from here on out I will refer to as just overselectivity) looks at a photograph, she focuses on a detail in the picture to the exclusion of all else and loses the gestalt of the image. Overselectivity is often described as tunnel vision–the detail becomes the whole. For instance, this photo of a kid’s closet might be described as a picture of Arthur the aardvark (or a St. Bernard, or a firetruck–depending on the detail the child chooses).

How Can You Tell?

If the child you work with is verbal, you can show him a photo that is rich in detail and ask what he sees. If he is more interested in a background detail of the image than in the story the image tells, that is usually overselectivity at work. Figuring out what a non-verbal child focuses on is more of a challenge. You could ask them to point to the important part of the picture, or you could try a lesson like:

• What’s the Picture About? (Matching), VizZle ID Number: 42705
  Image and text w/audio question (i.e., “What is the picture about?) TO image with focus square and text w/audio sentence describing main theme, with set distractor for over selectivity, field of 2 choices, set distractor, 10 pairs
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)

But if you can’t pinpoint it one way or the other, your awareness that overselectivity could be an issue is your best defense.

Choosing the Right Images

Look critically at the images you are using. Is there any kind of a background? A cutout (where the background is removed) might work better. Look carefully at the details. Is the person pictured wearing a shirt with a logo or a character on it? Cropping so that detail doesn’t show might be necessary.

Even though a line drawing requires a higher level understanding of abstraction, it may be a better choice than a photo with a background or too much detail. Be willing to try different visual representations if the one you are using doesn’t seem to be working. There could be some distracting detail there kicking in the child’s overselectivity that you just aren’t seeing.

Lesson Examples

These lessons make excellent use of the images in the VizZle media database designed to meet the needs of kids with overselectivity issues.

• Actions (Book), VizZle ID Number: 42718
  Images of common action words (verbs) and short text w/ audio sentences (e.g., “She reads.”), with video models and popup quizzes for word discrimination (matching text to text), 9 pages
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Functional Grocery Vocab 1.1 (Matching), VizZle ID Number: 4180
  Match image w/audio to text, field of 3 choices, 10 pairs. Comparable to Edmark Functional Grocery Vocab Lesson 1
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Functional Grocery Vocab Review 1.1 to 1.5 (Game), VizZle ID Number: 2272
  Pop-up quizzes, match image to text, field of 3 choices, 14 tiles. Comparable to review of Edmark Grocery Words Book I
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)