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The trail making test: A review and compilation of normative data
Abstracts of 15th Annual Meeting
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evaluated for temporal lobectomy. 'The sample consisted of 126 known epilepsy patients admitted to a 24-hour EEG video monitoring unit as protocol for neurosurgery. There were 81 males and 45 females in the predominantly Caucasian (91%), fight-handed (88.1%) sample. The mean age was 39.2 years (SD = 11.1), mean educational level was 12.1 years (SD = 2.8), and mean WAIS FSIQ was 94.0 (SD = 14.9). Sixty-four percent of the sample had a history of seizure pathology for 10 or more years. Groups were classified according to abnormal EEG foci, that is, Left Temporal (LT, n = 40), Right Temporal (RT, n = 33), Bitemporal (BT, n = 26), and Normal EEG (NL, n = 25). The WAIS was administered as part of a comprehensive neuropsychological test battery. Results of this study failed to replicate the validity of the Russell WAIS Index in a population of known epilepsy patients, in particular, those with diagnosed temporal lobe epilepsy. The authors recommend cautious use of the Russell WAIS Index as a means of strict identification of left temporal lobe dysfunction. Results are discussed in relation to the original Dobbins and Russell (1990) index, gender, and chronicity.
Soukup, V. M., & Ingam, E The Trail Making Test: A Review and Compilation of Normative Data. The Trail Making Test (TMT) is one of the most frequently administered neuropsychological instruments, having been utilized in the evaluation of cognitive dysfunction for over 50 years. Despite the measure's extensive clinical use and proliferation of research, no comprehensive review of the adult TMT literature is available. This report provides a summary of the available TMT research to date, including a compilation of the existing normative data. A total of 22 published normative reports were examined. With exclusionary parameters identified, normative information was compiled for three comparison groups: (a) an adolescent and young adult group (ages 15-24), (b) an adult group (ages 20-54), and (c) an older adult group (ages 55-85). The data provide an alternative to reliance on single normative studies and provide compelling evidence for the use of sample-specific normative comparisons.
Spector, J., Lewandowski, A. G., & Kelly, M. P. Patterns of Neuropsychological Performance in Probable Malingerers on the HalsteadReitan Neuropsychological Batter3'. In a recent article, Greiffenstein, Baker, and Gola (1994) proposed guidelines for the identification of "probable" malingerers among mildly head injured patients, for purposes of clinical decision making and empirical research. Their classification criteria for overt malingering included (a) complaints of remote memory loss, (b) inconsistent or unsupported symptom histories, (c) total disability in important social roles, and (d) improbably poor neuropsychological test scores on at least two measures. The present study was intended to refine this last criterion by directly comparing neuropsychological test performance of malingering and nonmalingering mild head injury complainants. Subjects were 157 mild head injury litigants, 43 of which performed below clinical cut-off scores on the Portland Digit Recognition Test. All subjects were administered the Halstead Reitan Neuropsychological Battery, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised, the Wide Range Achievement Test-Revised, the Portland Digit Recognition Test, and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2. The malingering and non-malingering groups were similar in demographic composition, age, education, and time since injury. Malingering litigants performed worse than non-malingerers in nearly every neuropsychological function tested, with their most striking deficits on measures of simple attention, psychomotor speed, and short-term verbal memory. Malingering litigants performed significantly worse on aggregate measures of neuropsychological functioning, with an average Impairment Indexes (II) of 0.74 and General-Neuropsychological
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evaluated for temporal lobectomy. 'The sample consisted of 126 known epilepsy patients admitted to a 24-hour EEG video monitoring unit as protocol for neurosurgery. There were 81 males and 45 females in the predominantly Caucasian (91%), fight-handed (88.1%) sample. The mean age was 39.2 years (SD = 11.1), mean educational level was 12.1 years (SD = 2.8), and mean WAIS FSIQ was 94.0 (SD = 14.9). Sixty-four percent of the sample had a history of seizure pathology for 10 or more years. Groups were classified according to abnormal EEG foci, that is, Left Temporal (LT, n = 40), Right Temporal (RT, n = 33), Bitemporal (BT, n = 26), and Normal EEG (NL, n = 25). The WAIS was administered as part of a comprehensive neuropsychological test battery. Results of this study failed to replicate the validity of the Russell WAIS Index in a population of known epilepsy patients, in particular, those with diagnosed temporal lobe epilepsy. The authors recommend cautious use of the Russell WAIS Index as a means of strict identification of left temporal lobe dysfunction. Results are discussed in relation to the original Dobbins and Russell (1990) index, gender, and chronicity.
Soukup, V. M., & Ingam, E The Trail Making Test: A Review and Compilation of Normative Data. The Trail Making Test (TMT) is one of the most frequently administered neuropsychological instruments, having been utilized in the evaluation of cognitive dysfunction for over 50 years. Despite the measure's extensive clinical use and proliferation of research, no comprehensive review of the adult TMT literature is available. This report provides a summary of the available TMT research to date, including a compilation of the existing normative data. A total of 22 published normative reports were examined. With exclusionary parameters identified, normative information was compiled for three comparison groups: (a) an adolescent and young adult group (ages 15-24), (b) an adult group (ages 20-54), and (c) an older adult group (ages 55-85). The data provide an alternative to reliance on single normative studies and provide compelling evidence for the use of sample-specific normative comparisons.
Spector, J., Lewandowski, A. G., & Kelly, M. P. Patterns of Neuropsychological Performance in Probable Malingerers on the HalsteadReitan Neuropsychological Batter3'. In a recent article, Greiffenstein, Baker, and Gola (1994) proposed guidelines for the identification of "probable" malingerers among mildly head injured patients, for purposes of clinical decision making and empirical research. Their classification criteria for overt malingering included (a) complaints of remote memory loss, (b) inconsistent or unsupported symptom histories, (c) total disability in important social roles, and (d) improbably poor neuropsychological test scores on at least two measures. The present study was intended to refine this last criterion by directly comparing neuropsychological test performance of malingering and nonmalingering mild head injury complainants. Subjects were 157 mild head injury litigants, 43 of which performed below clinical cut-off scores on the Portland Digit Recognition Test. All subjects were administered the Halstead Reitan Neuropsychological Battery, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised, the Wide Range Achievement Test-Revised, the Portland Digit Recognition Test, and the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2. The malingering and non-malingering groups were similar in demographic composition, age, education, and time since injury. Malingering litigants performed worse than non-malingerers in nearly every neuropsychological function tested, with their most striking deficits on measures of simple attention, psychomotor speed, and short-term verbal memory. Malingering litigants performed significantly worse on aggregate measures of neuropsychological functioning, with an average Impairment Indexes (II) of 0.74 and General-Neuropsychological