Visual spatial perception in adolescents and their parents: the X-linked recessive hypothesis.

If high ability in visual spatial perception is determined by an X-linked recessive major gene, then the following pattern of correlations is expected across the four groups of parents and children, this is, the mother-son, father-daughter, mother-daughter, and father-son groups: rMS=rFD greater than rMD greater than rFS=0. In a sample of 129 adolescents and their parents, the Spatial Relations Test of the Differential Aptitude Test and the Identical Blocks Test showed the pattern of correlations expected under the above hypothesis, but the Water Level Test did not. The present results provide but limited support for the X-linked recessive hypothesis.