Pearson - Clinical and Talent Assessment - Australia and New Zealand

Description

First published in 1977 and revised in 2001, the SKT is a brief cognitive performance test for assessing memory and attention deficits within clinical settings. It is used for staging and monitoring the severity of cognitive impairment in patients with acute or chronic mental disorders. It is often used with patients presenting with mild cognitive impairment or mild to moderate dementia. The patient friendly test procedures are designed more like a challenging game rather than a psychological assessment. The nature of the test materials allow for easy bedside evaluation.

Content and Administration

The test consists of 9 subtests: naming objects, immediate recall, naming numerals, arranging blocks, replacing blocks, counting symbols, reversal naming, delayed recall and recognition memory. The SKT is available in 5 parallel forms (A, B, C, D, and E) which are used to avoid the practise effects associated with repeated test administration over short periods of time.

Scoring of Results

Subtest raw scores are converted into norm values, and then added to obtain a SKT total score. Norm values for each subtest range between 0 and 3, the SKT total scores vary between 0 and 27 with higher scores indicating more severe cognitive impairment. In addition to the total score, a memory and an attention sub-score can be calculated which allows for a separate assessment of these functions.

Norms

The SKT provides norm tables (n = 3,789) for six age groups. Within each age group norms are available for three categories of premorbid intelligence: IQ < 90; IQ 90–110 and IQ >110.

Interpretation of Results

The interpretation of SKT results is based on classifying the total score as typical for one of six degrees of cognitive impairment. The sub-scores for memory and attention are assessed separately in the same way. Scoring and interpreting the SKT are easy to learn and require approximately 3–5 minutes.