Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-third edition characteristics of a military traumatic brain injury sample

This article describes the postinjury cognitive functioning of a sample of active duty, retired, and military beneficiaries who received traumatic brain injuries. Patients were seen in the neuropsychology clinic at Brooke Army Medical Center for a detailed cognitive and personality assessment. The scores on a major component of this evaluation, the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale, third edition, are summarized. The results are compared with those reported in the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale, third edition technical manual for a smaller, less diverse sample. The findings are consistent with the formulation that stable verbal skills are most resistant to brain injury, followed by nonverbal reasoning and visuospatial ability, and then working memory with speed of information processing being the most vulnerable to the effects of brain injury.