Neuropsychological test

Neuropsychological tests are specifically designed tasks used to measure a psychological function known to be linked to a particular brain structure or pathway. They usually involve the systematic administration of clearly defined procedures in a formal environment. Neuropsychological tests are typically administered to a single person working with an examiner in a quiet office environment, free from distractions. As such, it can be argued that neuropsychological tests at times offer an estimate of a person's peak level of cognitive performance. Neuropsychological tests are a core component of the process of conducting neuropsychological assessment.

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Most neuropsychological tests in current use are based on traditional psychometric theory. In this model, a person's raw score on a test is compared to a large general population normative sample, that should ideally be drawn from a comparable population to the person being examined. Normative studies frequently provide data stratified by age, level of education, and/or ethnicity, where such factors have been shown by research to affect performance on a particular test. This allows for a person's performance to be compared to a suitable control group, and thus provide a fair assessment of their current cognitive functioning.

One popular test battery is the Halstead-Reitan Test Battery. The following list includes tests from it, and other commonly-used tests.

List of neuropsychological tests

• California Verbal Learning Test
• Controlled word association task (COWAT or FAS)
• Continuous Performance Task (CPT)
• Delis-Kaplan Executive Function System (D-KEFS)
• Hayling and Brixton tests
• Iowa gambling task
• Lexical decision task
• Memory Assessment Scales (MAS)
• Mini mental state examination (MMSE)
• Neuropsychological Assessment Battery (NAB)
• Paced Auditory Serial Addition Test (PASAT)
• Rey-Osterreith Complex Figure
• Stanford-Binet IQ test
• Stroop task
• Test of Variables of Attention (TOVA®)
• Tower of London Test
• Trail-Making Test (TMT) or Trails A & B
• Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS IQ test)
• Wechsler Memory Scale (WMS)
• Wisconsin card sorting task (WCST)

See also

• Clinical neuropsychology
• Neurocognitive
• Neuroimaging
• Psychological testing