Ethnically diverse examinees tend to perform lower on neuropsychological tests. The practice of adjusting normative comparisons for the education level and/or race to prevent overpathologizing low scores is problematic. Education quality, as measured by reading recognition, appears to be a more accurate benchmark for premorbid functioning in certain populations. The present study aimed to extend this line of research to traumatic brain injury (TBI). We hypothesized that a measure of reading recognition, the Wechsler Test of Adult Reading (WTAR), would account for racial differences in neuropsychological performance after TBI. Fifty participants (72% African American, 28% Caucasian) with moderate to severe TBI underwent neuropsychological testing at 1-year post-injury. Reading recognition accounted for all the same variance in neuropsychological performance as race and education (together), as well as considerable additional variance. Estimation of premorbid functioning in African Americans with TBI could be refined by considering reading recognition.
Keywords: neuropsychological testing; premorbid functioning; psychometrics; racial differences; traumatic brain injury.