Psychoeducational Test Batteries

Introduction

Psychoeducational test batteries are designed to provide a comprehensive assessment of an individual's strengths and weaknesses across a wide range of skills and abilities. Unlike standardized diagnostic testing which is used primarily to assess mastery of specific goals and objectives or areas of deficit (e.g. a commercially available norm-referenced test of mathematics), comprehensive test batteries are more general in focus, sampling from a broad array of skills within a particular domain. To date, the domains most typically represented are those of (a) cognitive or intellectual abilities, and (b) broad-based academic achievement. Each of these domains is then represented by a variety of subtests that are designed to assess the specific features of their respective domains. That is, the cognitive or intellectual portion of the psychoeducational test battery would contain a number and variety of subtests purported to assess specific features of intellectual development (e.g. short- and long-term memory, fluid and crystallized reasoning), and the academic achievement portion of the battery would be organized tasks associated with the process of schooling (e.g. reading, spelling, mathematics, written expression).

The use of psychoeducational test batteries offer two major advantages in clinical use (Salvia & Ysseldyke, 1995). First, from a technical adequacy standpoint the use of the same normative sample provides derived scores across domains that are logically linked. Simply, observed scores across domains (i.e. cognitive and achievement) are directly comparable since they were derived from the same normative sample. This helps alleviate the problems brought about by the indiscriminate practice of comparing observed scores obtained from tests with different normative samples. For example, if a student obtains a score of 100 (mean = 100, standard deviation = 15) on a test of cognitive or intellectual development and a score of 92 on a test of academic achievement it is difficult, if possible, to determine if such a difference is indeed true or a result of differences in the norms of the two tests brought about as a function of the two different normative samples.

Second, psychoeducational test batteries provide psychologists and clinicians a convenient method for assessing a broad array of skills across multiple domains with one test. In doing so, the assessor avoids redundancies in assessment that may come about as a result of combining tests that are not co-developed and share similar assessment features. Because psychoeducational test batteries are developed from a uniform theoretical perspective, they are less likely to assess the same underlying specific abilities across subtests and domains. Doing so reduces repetitious assessment and facilitates interpretation.

Specific Psychoeducational Test Batteries: Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Third Edition and the Wechsler Individual Achievement Test

The Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Third Edition (WISC-III; Wechsler, 1991) is the most recent version of the Wechsler scales for children ages 6 through to 16 years old. The WISC-III is made up of 13 subtests that comprise a Verbal Scale IQ, a Performance Scale IQ, and a Full Scale IQ. By design, the Verbal Scale attempts to measure verbal comprehension and includes the application of verbal skills and information to the solution of new problems, the ability to process verbal information, and the ability to think with words. Comparatively, the Performance Scale is designed to measure perceptual organization and involves visual processing, planning and organizational ability, and non-verbal learning and memory.

...