Neuropsychological testing for sports-related concussion: how athletes can sandbag their baseline testing without detection.

Neuropsychological baseline testing is commonplace in the assessment of concussion; however, claims of "sandbagging" the baseline have led neuropsychologists to ask to what extent athletes can perform intentionally poorly on baseline testing without reaching threshold on the test validity indicators. Seventy-five undergraduate athletes were re-administered the ImPACT neurocognitive battery, which they had previously taken to establish baseline functioning, but were instructed to perform more poorly than their baseline without reaching threshold on the test validity indicators. Eight participants were able to successfully fake significantly lower scores without detection by validity indicators.

Attitudes about depression and its treatment among mental health professionals, lay persons and immigrants and refugees in Norway.

Background: Internationally, depression is a common psychological disorder whose treatment depends upon its identification by treating professionals as well as patient utilization of mental health care systems; the latter often being hampered by cultural differences between patients and health professionals.

Method: The current study used vignettes of depressed patients which varied the culture and/or social circumstances of the patient to assess whether these variables influenced the conceptualization of depression and its treatment. Participants (N=722) included mental health professionals, lay people, immigrants, and refugees in Norway.

Why one fakes a head injury affects how one fakes a head injury.

Identifying suspect effort in neuropsychological assessments has been investigated in clinical samples and experimental simulation paradigms. While patients' incentives, such as compensation, are commonly thought to impact motivation, other motivational influences, such as attention-seeking, have been largely unexplored. To this end, undergraduates (n=202) were asked to fake a head injury on the Dot Counting Test, California Verbal Learning Test, and Benton Visual Retention Test.

The effects of motivation, coaching, and knowledge of neuropsychology on the simulated malingering of head injury.

Two student groups, introductory psychology (n=91) and advanced neuroscience (n=34) undergraduates, were asked to malinger a head injury on Rey's 15-Item Test (FIT) and Dot Counting Test (DCT). The participants were randomly assigned to one of three motivation conditions (no motivation given, compensation, avoidance of blame for a motor vehicle accident) and to one of three coaching conditions (no coaching, coaching post-concussive symptoms, coaching symptoms plus warning of malingering detection). Analyses revealed a MotivationxStudent Group interaction on the FIT, indicating that the advanced neuroscience students, particularly when in the compensation condition, malingered the most flagrantly.

Depressive symptom patterns in patients with Parkinson's disease and other older adults.

Research on depression in Parkinson's disease (PD) has suggested that PD patients experience a qualitatively different depression from that of other older adults, endorsing fewer cognitive symptoms of depression (e.g., guilt, failure) and greater somatic (e.