A UK pilot study: The specificity of the Word Memory Test effort sub‐tests in acute minimal to mild head injury

The specificity of the Word Memory Test ( WMT ) effort indices was examined in 48 individuals with minimal to mild head injury ( MHI ) in the acute stages post‐injury. None of the individuals was involved in litigation or disability claims. At the established cut‐offs, the WMT had an unacceptable false‐positive rate (18%). T test analysis was also carried out for WMT passers and failures on a battery of neuropsychometric measures and across a range of demographic variables. The WMT was performed at a significantly lower level on the Wechsler Memory Scale – III word list sub‐tests and verbal fluency tests ( p  < .05). This suggests that WMT failure may be indicative of a specific deficit in verbal processing in the acute phase of MHI .