It encompasses intellectual scores, adaptive functioning scores from an adaptive behavior rating scale based on descriptions of known abilities provided by someone familiar with the person, and also the observations of the assessment examiner who is able to find out directly from the person what he or she can understand, communicate, and such like. IQ assessment must be based on a current test. This enables a diagnosis to avoid the pitfall of the Flynn effect, which is a consequence of changes in population IQ test performance changing IQ test norms over time. Distinction from other disabilities
Clinically, intellectual disability is a subtype of cognitive deficit or disabilities affecting intellectual abilities, which is a broader concept and includes intellectual deficits that are too mild to properly qualify as intellectual disability, or too specific (as in specific learning disability), or acquired later in life through acquired brain injuries or neurodegenerative diseases like dementia. Cognitive deficits  may appear at any age. Developmental disability is any disability that is due to problems with growth and development. This term encompasses many congenital medical conditions that have no mental or intellectual components, although it, too, is sometimes used as a euphemism for intellectual disability. Limitations in more than one area
Adaptive behavior, or adaptive functioning, refers to the skills needed to live independently (or at the minimally acceptable level for age). To assess adaptive behavior, professionals compare the functional abilities of a child to those of other children of similar age.
Many English idioms mention the back, usually highlighting it as an area of vulnerability; one must "watch ones back", or one may end up "with ones back up against the wall"; worse yet, someone may "stab one in the back", but hopefully a friend "has got ones back". The back is also a symbol of strength and hard work, with those seeking physical labor looking for "strong backs", and workers being implored to "put their back into it". Historically, flagellation of a person across the back with a whip was both a common form of punishment of criminals, and a common means of forcing slaves to work. As well, self-flagellation, as in self punishment, may include the use of whipping oneself. This is one method of mortification, the practice of inflicting physical suffering on oneself with the religious belief that it will serve as penance for ones own sins or those of others. While more moderate forms of mortification are widely practiced—particularly in the Catholic Church—self flagellation is not encouraged by mainstream religions or religious leaders. A well-known instrument used for flagellations is the infamous Cat o Nine Tails, a nine-corded whip with one handle enabling a much more effective whipping than would be possible with only one lashing at a time. == References ==