title: Taking account of age-related differences on Digit Symbol and Incidental Recall for diagnostic purposes.
abstract: The purpose of the present study was to develop age-related normative data on the WAIS Digit Symbol subtest, and a short form of the Digit Symbol Incidental Recall test, for a nonclinical population of English-speaking South Africans with a relatively high level of education. The tests were administered to 131 individuals between the age of 20 and 89 years with at least 10 years of education (mean = 14.93 years; range = 10-22 years). A significant age effect was found on both tests. Preliminary normative data across five age groups (20-39, 40-59, 60-69, 70-79, and 80-89 years) are presented, and are considered diagnostically useful for clinical practice on persons of above-average intelligence. The utility of the short form of the recall test is confirmed and advocated particularly for work on older age groups.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa.
authors.forename: A B
authors.initials: AB
authors.lastname: Shuttleworth-Jordan
authors.forename: S G
authors.initials: SG
authors.lastname: Bode
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000375:Aging / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention; D004193:Discrimination Learning; D005260:Female; D015577:Geriatric Assessment; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011939:Mental Recall; D008875:Middle Aged; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual; D012016:Reference Values; D014888:Wechsler Scales / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*