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OVERVIEW

Why did this student score so low on WISC-V Arithmetic? Is it a problem with calculation speed, working memory, or math computation? It would help to be sure, so I could decide what to recommend.

I wonder if her visual working memory, if I could measure it, would be in the average range like her WISC-V Auditory Working Memory Index? It's important to know, so I can be surer about what accommodations to recommend.

These WISC-V results are odd. What do they mean? The child received a scaled score of 5 on Block Design but a scaled score of 10 on Visual Puzzles.

If this child didn't have to retrieve information and could just recognize it instead, would it maybe help as a modification?

These questions, and many others, can be addressed using the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Fifth Edition Integrated (WISC-V Integrated; Wechsler & Kaplan, 2015). The WISC-V Integrated is a companion measure of the most widely used intelligence test for children in the world, the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Fifth Edition (WISC-V; Wechsler, 2014). It enables practitioners to learn more about the cognitive processes and test-taking behaviors that affect performance on the WISC-V that also affect school performance.

The WISC-V was a substantial revision of this popular test, which continues the progressive trend of recent Wechsler intelligence scale revisions that mirror contemporary advances in intelligence theory, neuropsychology, cognitive neuroscience, and psychometric methodology. Major modifications were made to the content and structure of the WISC-V to reflect these advances. The WISC-V Integrated subtests can be used to understand WISC-V results in greater detail to enable practitioners to test hypotheses about WISC-V results and to inform intervention recommendations.

For example, where the WISC-V has Verbal Comprehension subtests (Similarities, Vocabulary, Information, and Comprehension), which each requires verbal expression of the responses, the WISC-V Integrated has multiple-choice versions of these subtests with the same items that allow selection of a response from among options that are read aloud to the child and viewed in a stimulus book. These are ideally suited for obtaining an estimate of verbal abilities without requiring expressive language.

The WISC-V Integrated also contains two index scores: the Multiple Choice Verbal Comprehension Index (MCVCI) and the Visual Working Memory Index (VWMI). These scores provide reliable and valid estimates of specific abilities that can be used in concert with the WISC-V index scores in a similar manner to the WISC-V Integrated subtests, which are used to understand WISC-V subtest performance. The index scores are useful in specific situations (e.g., conducting evaluations of children who may have expressive difficulties or challenges or obtaining a broader assessment of a particular area of concern, such as working memory problems).

This book expands on the selection of index scores to provide Essentials composite scores for situations in which appropriate measures of ability ideally would not involve motor skills (e.g., for a child with motor delays) or not rely on expressive responses (e.g., a child with language disorder with expressive impairment). These Essentials composite scores mirror the published WISC-V composite scores in some cases. For example, a Full Scale Score that does not require motor performance is included, as is a Full Scale Score that does not require expressive responses. Others among the Essentials composite scores were constructed as similar nonexpressive or nonmotor parallels of composite scores that were created by other authors (i.e., Flanagan & Alfonso, 2017; Kaufman, Raiford, & Coalson, 2016) and included in books to accommodate practical needs or interpretation using a Cattell-Horn-Carroll (CHC) framework.

The online resources for this book include an interpretive program that automatically calculates the Essentials composite scores not available within the published test and provides data relevant to comparisons of those index scores with WISC-V composite scores. These additional index scores were developed to enhance interpretation in special clinical situations (e.g., an expanded index score that is derived from more subtests on the cognitive domain, an index score that does not require expressive responses) and theoretical perspectives (e.g., CHC). The online resources that accompany this book include the WISC-V Integrated Interpretive Assistant 1.0, scoring software that calculates norms for the Essentials composite scores and walks the practitioner through the interpretive approach in Chapter 4, including numerous score comparisons not available in the published test that can more fully inform interpretation.

The WISC-V Integrated scores can be interpreted from a normative perspective. That is, a child's cognitive processes can be understood by comparing scores to those obtained by others of approximately the same age (i.e., comparison to a normative reference group). This comparison helps practitioner to understand how the child benefits from modifications or scaffolding in tasks relative to other children his or her age.

The WISC-V Integrated scores can also be interpreted from an intrapersonal perspective. A total raw score from a WISC-V subtest can be compared directly to a total raw score from a corresponding WISC-V Integrated adaptation subtest, because they have the same item content. This enables inferences about which cognitive processes affected performance on the WISC-V subtest and provides information about how a child might better succeed with accommodations or modifications for schoolwork.

The performance on WISC-V items of subtests with corresponding WISC-V Integrated adaptation subtests (e.g., Vocabulary and Vocabulary Multiple Choice, Arithmetic and Arithmetic Process Approach) can also be compared to learn more about the child's specific knowledge of content. For example, if the definition of cat is not expressed in response to an open-ended question, the child may be able to select the best meaning from among five response options, such as (a) An animal, (b) It eats cat food, (c) It runs, (d) It's furry, (e) It's small.

The goal of this book is to provide a go-to reference for novice examiners and proficient practitioners using the WISC-V Integrated. Administration, scoring, and interpretive information is clearly and succinctly covered in successive chapters, incorporating the familiar Rapid Reference, Caution, and Don't Forget boxes that are hallmark features of the Essentials series. The author, who was the lead WISC-V and WISC-V Integrated research director, also includes Behind the Scenes boxes that offer insights into the test development process. Test questions are included at the conclusion of each chapter to highlight critical content.

HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES ON THE PROCESS APPROACH TO COGNITIVE ASSESSMENT

The process approach to cognitive assessment has its roots in ideas put forth by Heinz Werner (1937), who proposed that cognitive assessment that involves careful and systematic observation of problem-solving strategies yields information that is more rich and useful than correct-incorrect scoring. He suggested that cognitive task performance involves multiple, dynamic processes. Any of these processes may contribute individually or in combination with others to exert an influence on responses and performance. For example, a child may have difficulty with Block Design because of low motor skills, but another child low performance on the same task may be related to impaired visual spatial processing. Although both may score similarly on Block Design, the poor performance traces back to two different origins.

Process approaches to assessment recognize that in completing any cognitive task, regardless of its complexity, a number of mental processes are involved. These processes can range from simple (e.g., sensing, perceiving, motor functioning) to more complex (e.g., reasoning, decision making) (Kaufman et al., 2016). A problem with any of these processes can result in difficulties completing the overall task. The process approach aims to understand the reasons for low scores through identifying the cognitive processes that operate jointly on performance, breaking them down to more-specific components in a stepwise fashion or altering the task in some manner and testing hypotheses with tasks that involve fewer or different cognitive processes. For example, the hypothesis that low motor skills resulted in a lower Block Design score could be more closely examined by presenting the completed design and multiple pictured sets of blocks in a stimulus book and asking the examinee to select the set of blocks that, when assembled, make the design.

There are many approaches that have focused on understanding the cognitive processes involved in performance on the Wechsler scales, beginning with an approach first used by David Wechsler. He stated that "individuals attaining identical scores on intelligence tests cannot always be classified in the same way" (Wechsler, 1944, p. 12). Always a clinician, his approach was somewhat psychoanalytic in nature. It described how poor performance could result from various issues with cognitive processes and that information at the task and item level...