Among the more effective psychological teat indicators of brain injury, paper and pencil maze problema(6, 6 -7), and those involving brief, timed exposure to geometric designs with immediate reproduction (*. *. ') have demonstrated considerable promise. The Benton Visual Retention Teat and the Porteus Mazes have been among the more commonly employed, in part because of their convenience, availability and economy. Memory span for digits has also been widely utilized in tests of intelligence, and poor performance is often used as an indication of mental impairment.
METHODAs part of a project to compare discriminative ability and measure the degree to which the results of the Benton could be substituted for the Portem, the former was administered to 155 male patients in a VA general hospital and the latter to 140 of these. All the Ss were also given the WAIS. The Ss ranged in age from 19 to 80 years, M = 46.2, SD 11.4, and in I& with a mean of 96.3 f 12.8. Of the 155 Ss, 51 were classified as normal (without indications of brain injury), 49 were designated as organic (brain damaged), 44 were categorized as indeterminate, and ll were unclassified. Four criteria of organicity were employed: positive neurological signs, a positive electroencephalogram, an organic pictuie in psychological testing, and current, objective medical evidence of organic brain damage, such as the residuals of a cerebral vascular accident. For our purpoees, a patient was classified as organic if two or more of the criteria were fulfilled. Thoee patients to whom only a single criterion applied were grouped as indeterminate, and those for whom adequate clinical data were not available constituted the unclassified group.The correlation between the number of correct reproductions and number of errors on the Benton has been described as about .85, while the association of teat scores with intelligence in normal Ss approaches .7(1). An appreciable negative relationship with age is also routinely demonstrated. No association in 117 normal adult Ss between Porteus scores and age was found by this investigator though a correlation of the order of .4 was obtained with intelligence. Digit Span score correlations with WAIS I Q s in the range of .6 are reported ( 8 , p -n) as is a curvilinear but generally negative relationship with age.
RESULTSIN TEE " m m m G m m TAB= 1. MEAN SCOREB, STANDAUD DIOVXATIONS AND SIONIRCANCEI OF D I~~~B E N W N o d (N = 51) Indeterminate (N = 44) Organic (N = (49) b 41.3 f 8.6 44.6 f 10.3 53.2 f 12.2-