RETRACTED – Intra-individual Cognitive Variability: An Examination of ANAM4 TBI-MIL Simple Reaction Time Data from Service Members with and without Mild Traumatic Brain Injury

Objectives: The Automated Neuropsychological Assessment Metrics 4 TBI-MIL (ANAM4) is a computerized cognitive test often used in post-concussion assessments with U.S. service members (SMs). Existing evidence, however, remains mixed regarding ANAM4’s ability to identify cognitive issues following mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI). Studies typically examine ANAM4 by comparing mean scores to baseline or normative scores. A more fine-grained approach involves examining inconsistency within an individual’s performance. Methods: Data from a sample of 231 were healthy control SMs and 100 SMs within 7 days of mTBI who took the ANAM4 were included in analyses. We examine each individual’s performance on a simple reaction time (SRT) subtest that is administered at the beginning (SRT1) and end (SRT2) of the ANAM4 battery, and calculate the standard deviation of difference scores by trial across administrations. Results: Multivariate analysis of variance and univariate analyses revealed group differences across all comparisons (p0.41). Conclusions: While inconsistencies in performance are often viewed as noise or test error, the results suggest intra-individual cognitive variability may be more sensitive than central tendency measures (i.e., comparison of means) in detecting changes in cognitive function in mTBI. Additionally, the findings highlight the utility of ANAM4’s repeating a subtest at two points in a battery to explore within-subject differences in performance. (JINS, 2017, 23, 1–6)