What is
What is neuropsychological assessment?
The evaluation of brain and nervous system function as it relates to behavior.
What is the
Conceptual Model of Brain-Behavior Relationships
According to this view, each neuropsychological test or procedure evaluates one or more of the following categories. The order corresponds roughly to the order in which incoming information is analyzed by the brain in preparation for a response or motor output.
- Sensory input
- Attention and concentration
- Learning and memory
- Language
- Spatial and manipulatory ability
- Executive functions
- Motor output
What are the
Executive Functions?
- Volition – Capacity for intentional behavior, the ability to conceptualize a goal.
- Planning – The identification of the steps needed to achieve the goal.
- Purposive action –The capacity to take action and sustain it in an orderly manner.
- Effective performance – The ability to monitor one’s activites in light of the original goals and shift strategies as needed.
What is the difference between a
Fixed and a Flexible Approach to Testing?
A fixed test is like the Wechsler Scales, where there are certain subtests you have to use. You can’t just bring in subtests from the SB5 or something.
A flexible approach is finding different tests you like in different places and putting them together.
You can have both of these types of tests in neuropsychological assessment.
What is the
Halstead-Reitan Neuropsychological Battery?
A widely used fixed neuropsychological battery.
- Category Test – Requires examinee to find the rules of categorizing geometric shapes. Measure abstract reasoning and concept formation.
- Tactual Performance Test – Blindfolded examinee places blocks on board.
- Speech Sounds Perception Test – Identify the written version of a nonsense word out of four choices.
- Seashore Rhythm Test – Musical rhythms are the same or different.
- Finger Tapping Test – Measure motor speed, tap finger for 10 seconds.
What is
Luria-Nebraska Neuropsychological Battery
A fixed battery, with a shorter administration time than the Halstead-Reitan, although not quite as popular.
What is
Trailmaking?
- Circles scattered on page have numbers and letters
- Connect circles in a pattern 1-A-2-B-3-C
- This is a test of concentration.
What is the
Sensory-Perceptual Exam?
On this test, normal people seldom make any errors. Measures contralateral functioning, as in the functioning of each brain hemisphere.
- A soft snap of the fingers next to one ear vs the other ear. Can they tell where the sound came from?
- Identify which number has been traced on the fingertip
- Connecting sensory processing to a cognitive skill
What are
Continuous Performance Tests?
- Measures attention/concentration
- Computerized
- Can have visual or auditory stimuli
- Every time you see this letter, hit the spacebar
- How many time do you fail to hit, or hit on the wrong place
- Challenges
- Many tests go by the name “continuous performance test”
- How do you come up with a good test if everyone is kind of doing their own thing?
What is the
Wechsler Memory Scale-IV?
A test of learning and memory. Learning and memory are difficult to measure in isolation.
- Major revision of previous version (60 years)
- Co-normed with the WAIS-IV
- 2 Cautions
- Don’t use the test in isolation (it’s not a shortcut to diagnosing, say, dementia)
- Don’t over-interpret low scores, make sure you consider other possible interpretations. Certain scales where people who have lower educational experiences, may get lower scores, which doesn’t indicate brain damage.
What is the
Wide Range Assessment of Memory and Learning-2 (WRAML-2)
The first comprehensive memory scale designed for use with children (ages 5 to 17 years).
What is
What is the test for aphasia?
- Practitioners kind of do their own thing
- Types of tests
- Spontaneous speech
- Word retrieval
- Neologisms
- Repetition: “No ifs, ands or buts”
- “Methodist Episcopal”
- “Does your car have handlebars.”
What is the
Bender Visual-Motor Gestalt Test?
Design Copying Test
Copying designs on cards: square circle, dots across card, little circles.
What does the
Draw-A-Clock Test?
Part of the Mini-Mental State Exam
Alzheimer’s and other types of dementia.
What is the
Wisconsin Card Sorting Test?
Test of Executive Functions
- Shapes on the cards
- Sort the cards according to an unknown guideline
- Once they get 10 cards right you change the rule without telling them
- You have to figure out the pattern and you have to be flexible
What is the
Mini-Mental State Exam?
- Areas addressed
- Orientation (to time and place, very important in psychological setting)
- Memory
- Speech
- Mood
- This is like the psychological equivalent of a general physical exam. Information entered into a medical profile.
- Remember three objects
- Count backwards from 100 by 7
- Name these objects
- Take a piece of paper, fold it in half, put it on the floor
- It’s not a shortcut to a diagnosis
What do we know about
Job Interviews?
- Typical job interviews don’t appear to be reliable or useful according to research
- Structured interviews have better reliability and validity. But most places don’t do this.
- Why are we using interviews so frequently?
- People believe in their gut.
- It would be weird not to meet a person you were going to hire. (personal need)
- It seems easy compared to research on selection tests
- Sometimes you need the interview to sell the person on the job.
What is important about
Cognitive Ability Tests?
- Correlate with work performance
- Tests of general cognitive ability tend to be better than tests of specific cognitive ability
- May have adverse impact on minority job candidates
- Shouldn’t be used alone
What is the
Wonderlic?
The Wonderlic Contemporary Cognitive Ability Test
- A test of general mental ability
- It’s short and quick
- Good psychometric properties
- Heft and cleft (opposite, similar or neither?)
What is
What is the In-Basket Test?
A test of work performance based on something concrete.
What are the multiple approaches to
Performance Appraisals?
- Multiple approaches
- Peer evaluation - tend to be too lenient
- Absenteeism
- Supervisor rating sales
What is
What are the concerns about concrete performance appraisals?
- Concerns with performance measures
- May not be completely under the individual’s control
- Maybe a person has a specific region under their supervision. They can’t sell as much to the poorer neighborhood.
- May not be applicable to most jobs
- There may not be a good performance measure. It’s not as concrete as number of items sold or built.
- May be misleading
- If it’s how many units they make, what if they make lots and they’re faulty.
- You can have concrete measures that are easily attainable but will not tell the whole story.
- May not be completely under the individual’s control
What is
What are sources of error in performance appraisals?
- Halo effect – When you get a rating that’s different than what you should get because of something unrelated to your performance. Maybe you’re a likable person. Maybe they’ve never missed a day work.
- Rater bias – Some people just respond to questions in a way that inherently has some bias. Leniency bias and severity bias.
- Context bias – Comparisons when you make the most amazing person the standard. They could be in the 99th percentile.
- Criterion contamination – I should have a certain standard, but sometimes the standard becomes contaminated and the responses shift a little bit. Adequate training for supervisors can reduce these errors.
What is
What is John Holland’s RIASEC Model?
Based on the theory of person-environment fit. If we know something about a person, then we might know where other people like them work.
