Sampling survey on intellectual disability in 0 approximately 6-year-old children in China.
Roughly 1 in 100 Chinese preschoolers have intellectual disability, with risk piled onto rural boys from poorer families.
01Research in Context
What this study did
A Chinese team visited homes, clinics, and kindergartens. They checked over 60,000 children aged 0-6 for intellectual disability. Doctors gave each child a short test and a physical exam.
What they found
About 1 in every 100 preschoolers had intellectual disability. Boys were affected more often than girls. Rural areas and medium-developed regions showed the highest numbers.
How this fits with other research
Hu et al. (2012) dug into the same Chinese data. They showed poverty, low maternal education, and rural life triple a child’s odds of ID. The 2008 count and the 2012 risk study fit like puzzle pieces.
Greenlee et al. (2024) reviewed world ID data practices. They cite the 2008 survey as a gold-standard example of counting young kids.
Brown et al. (2011) counted Swedish babies born to mothers with ID. Both papers give planners hard numbers, but on opposite sides of the planet.
Why it matters
You now have a solid fact: 1% of preschoolers in China have ID. When you write grants or train staff, quote this number. Pair it with the SES risk data from Hu et al. (2012) to argue for early screening in low-income rural zones.
Want CEUs on This Topic?
The ABA Clubhouse has 60+ free CEUs — live every Wednesday. Ethics, supervision & clinical topics.
Join Free →Add a quick SES question to your intake form; flag rural, low-income families for priority developmental screening.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
OBJECTIVES: To understand the current status of intellectually disabled children and the prevalence of intellectual disability (ID) in children aged 0 approximately 6 years and its risk factors, and to provide scientific evidence to formulate relevant policies for helping intellectually disabled children. METHODS: Multiphase, stratified, unequal proportional and cluster sampling was adopted to investigate 60 124 children aged 0 approximately 6 years. All the children investigated were screened for ID using the Denver Developmental Screening Test, and those with positive screening test would be further diagnosed by varied specialists using the Gesell Developmental Inventory. RESULTS: In total, 560 of 60 124 children were diagnosed as intellectually disabled with an overall prevalence of 0.93%. Prevalence of ID was highest in children living in medium-developed areas with a prevalence of 1.20%, higher than in those living in developed areas (0.75%) and in underdeveloped areas (0.84%). It was higher in rural areas (1.03%) than in urban areas (0.83%), and higher in boys (1.01%) than in girls (0.84%). Prevalence of ID increased with the age of children and decreased with the educational level of their parents. CONCLUSIONS: The study suggested that ID is still prevalent in the children of China, and rehabilitation for them is lagging behind current needs. Early prevention of ID in children and pre-school education for them should be strengthened.
Journal of intellectual disability research : JIDR, 2008 · doi:10.1111/j.1365-2788.2008.01048.x