Sex, Ethnicity, Age and Education Effects on the Trail Making Test in a Sample of Heroin Abusers

Abstract

Sex, ethnicity, age and education effects on the Trail Making test (TMT), a test often used for screening for cognitive impairment, are examined in a sample of heroin abusers in drug abuse treatment programs. A mixed race sample was drawn from electronic files of data from the Drug Abuse Treatment outcome Study (DATOS). The DATOS was a naturalistic, prospective cohort study that collected data from 1991-1993 in 96 programs in 11 cities in the United States. The number of heroin abusers with TMT scores available for analysis was 1548. Data were analyzed to determine the effects of sex, ethnicity, age and education variables on the two parts of the TMT in this large treatment sample of heroin abusers. The variables of sex, age, ethnicity and education were statistically significant for both parts A and B of the TMT. Nonetheless, R-Square values for overall models were quite weak (A =. 08. B =.13) suggesting that sex, ethnicity, age and education effects on the TMT, while clearly present, account for relatively little overall variance in terms of heroin users' TMT performance. These results arc consistent with earlier research using a more heterogenous drug abuse treatment sample.