The Draw-a-Person Test in Neuropsychological Assessment

Abstract

The Draw-a-Person test (former Draw a Man test) comes from the intelligence diagnostics of children, but the procedure also gives a wealth of interesting results in patients with brain damage. Goal: The aim of the study was to investigate to what extent drawing ability is impaired in people with brain damage and how strong the connection is with other neuropsychological investigations. Methods: The result of the Draw-a-Person test (DAPT) was compared with the: Mini-Mental Status Examination, Verbal Learning and Memory Test, Number Connection Test, “Personalities” test from Kaufmann's Test battery, Hooper's Visual Organization Test and Mosaic test of the Hamburg Wechsler intelligence Scale. Participants: The data was collected as part of a field study in a clinic for Neurology and a neuropsychological practice, so there are often only preliminary diagnoses. Since this study is about the correlations of the tests only, differences in diagnosis are not considered as a bias. For the present study, the data from a total of 50 patients (mean age 70.2 ±13.0 years, 24 males, 26 females) were evaluated. The patients suffered from: stroke (n=19), dementia (n=10), traumatic brain injury (n=5), transient ischemic attack (n=4), heart attack (n=3), encephalitis (n=2), Parkinson's disease (n=2), cerebral hemorrhage (n=1), other diagnoses (n=4, e.g. vitamin-B12 deficiency, seizures, confusion). Results: The correlations to the DAP-Test were: Mini-Mental Status Examination Rho=0.66*; Verbal Learning and Memory Test 1st round: Rho=0.34*; 5th round: Rho=0.44*; 6th round: Rho=0.23 (n.s.); 7th round: Rho=0.30 (n.s.); Number Connection Test Rho= -0.29*; “Personalities” test Rho = 0.44*; Hooper’s Visual Organization Test Rho = 0.61*; Mosaic Test Rho = 0.57*. Conclusion: The DAP test is an easy-to-perform procedure that only takes a few minutes and is very economical. The test gives initial indications for many visual-constructive deficits as e.g. neglect, visual agnosia and correlates significantly with many other neuropsychological instruments.