Methods of Neuropsychological Test Interpretation

This chapter and much of the remaining content of this e-book focuses upon methods of neuropsychological test interpretation. Some graduate students are taught highly specific ways of organizing test data. One method of test interpretation organizes tests according to the domain that corresponds with the name of a test in question. Other students and clinical practitioners simply report test findings by specifically organizing a report according to the name of the test. In our view, this makes the integration of test findings extremely difficult. Reports grounded in this type of framework almost never achieve consistency and seem inherently contradictory. We present a highly specific way of organizing a very high volume of neuropsychological evaluation data. This system avoids all possible interpretative idiosyncracy, it forces the practitioner to problem-solve when test scores might initially seem contradictory, and it allows the examiner to interpret every case systematically in order to ensure optimal outcomes. Furthermore, this way of interpreting test data leads directly to writing a coherent report, since the data are interpreted in the same way in which the results were initially organized. Therefore, the practitioner never “loses” the original “anchor points.” First, we develop a foundation by exploring certain assumptions and facts; this is followed by a systematic interpretative methodology.