Date of Award

8-24-2024

Document Type

Doctoral Research Paper

Degree Name

Psy.D.

Organizational Unit

Graduate School of Professional Psychology

First Advisor

Kathryn Barrs

Second Advisor

John Holmberg

Third Advisor

Lauren M. McGrath

Keywords

Neuropsychology, Pediatric, Performance validity testing, Reading disability

Abstract

Neuropsychological evaluation is a valuable tool for characterizing individual neurocognitive profiles in a range of congenital and acquired brain conditions. The usefulness of neuropsychological testing relies on accurate data which can only be obtained from reliable and credible performance. Inaccurate test data can lead to an underestimate of a child’s true abilities, false diagnoses, and a misallocation of community resources and services. Performance validity tests (PVTs) are stand-alone or embedded measures that assist psychologists in determining if an individual’s performance is valid. Despite a growing understanding in the importance of consistently using PVTs in pediatric neuropsychological evaluation over the last 15 years, research and clinical use continues to lag behind relative to adult neuropsychological practice. In particular, there is a dearth of evidence investigating the use of PVTs among children and adolescents with reading difficulties and with specific learning disorder in reading/dyslexia. It is important to empirically validate the use of PVTs in this population to avoid false determinations of noncredible performance. It may be that children and adolescents with reading difficulties perform worse on tests that require them to draw on related cognitive vulnerabilities. Thus, this study aims to analyze and report failure rates of the Memory Validity Profile (MVP), the automatized sequences task, an embedded digit span measure, and the Hillside Rating Scale. This study also aims to compare these measures to one another and determine if reading difficulties or other variables are correlated with PVT failure. We hope that this study will contribute to the paucity of literature on the topic and help clinicians feel more confident selecting PVTs for clinical use with children and adolescents with reading difficulties.

Copyright Date

7-1-2024

Copyright Statement / License for Reuse

All Rights Reserved
All Rights Reserved.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the author. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.

Rights Holder

Morgan Jolliffe

Provenance

Received from author

File Format

application/pdf

Language

English (eng)

Extent

42 pgs

File Size

321 KB

Available for download on Thursday, July 15, 2027



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