The Brief Assessment of Cognition in Schizophrenia. Normative data for the Italian population

Abstract

To provide normative values for the Italian population for the Brief Assessment of Cognition in Schizophrenia (BACS), a recent brief neuropsychological instrument for the assessment of cognition in patients with schizophrenia. Data were collected from 204 healthy adult Italian subjects, stratified by gender, education and age. Tests included in the BACS are the following: list learning, digit sequencing, verbal fluency, token motor task, symbol-coding and Tower of London. Normative values were established using the Equivalent Scores method in order to enable comparison with other neuropsychological tasks commonly used in the assessment of the Italian population. Performance on the BACS was influenced by the commonest demographic variables such as age and education. The availability of normative data for the Italian population will increase the usefulness of this test for both clinical and experimental purposes.