Some schools in India are reading the fingerprint patterns of their students to analyse their learning ability, aptitude and skills. The name of this technique which being increasingly adopted is Dermatoglyphics Multiple Intelligence Testing (DMIT) and schools are urging parents to have their wards assessed through it.
DMIT is a computer-generated assessment fingerprint pattern test, which determines a child’s learning styles and intelligence potential.
A national psychiatrists body has, however, appealed schools and parents to keep away from this widely marketed test that claims to assess children’s inborn intelligence from their fingerprints, asserting it is not backed by science.
The Indian Psychiatry Society said in a “position statement” and reported by The Telegraph that the DMIT is “not based on scientific evidence and is not useful for intelligence testing, brain lobe function testing or predicting future behaviour”. And it urged “parents and schools to stay away from such ill-founded practices”.
The statement comes against the backdrop of what some psychiatrists say is an exploitative market for DMIT assessments which claim to assess children’s inborn traits and are promoted through schools, including pre-nursery playschools. Many parents have told IPS members that schools charge anything between Rs 2,000 to Rs 5,000 for the assessment.
“This market is feeding on the ignorance and innocence of parents and their misplaced anxiety about their children’s so-called inborn traits,” Mrugesh Vaishnav, a senior psychiatrist in Ahmedabad and President of the Indian Psychiatric Society (IPS) was quoted by the Telegraph as saying.
Vaishnav said the IPS started discussing the issue a few months ago after several of its members received queries from parents about schools urging them to have their children assessed through fingerprint test. “I would call it a gimmick for the mind market,” he said.
The IPS consulted legal experts before releasing the position statement. “This is our view – we can only appeal to parents and schools. People are of course free to do what they want,” said Om Prakash Singh, a consultant psychiatrist in Calcutta and editor of the IPS journal – The Indian Journal of Psychiatry.
Several companies are selling what they describe as DMIT software and associated tools to schools across the country. Future Vision, a Pune-based company told The Telegraph that it had provided the product to over 300 schools across the country.
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