A factor analytic study of the construct validity of the verbal concept attainment test

The present study investigated the construct validity of the Verbal Concept Attainment Test (VCAT) by examining its relationship to other neuropsychological and reasoning tasks. It was found that the VCAT correlated highly with both the Similarities and Vocabulary subtests of the WAIS. It was suggested that the VCAT measures both verbal reasoning and verbal intelligence. Further, a high correlation was also found with both Verbal IQ and Performance IQ which indicated that the VCAT may also be regarded as a test of general intelligence. The relationship of the VCAT to several neuropsychological tests was also investigated. It was found that the VCAT correlated well with most of the neuropsychological tests employed. In addition, the strength of the correlation between each measure and the VCAT closely paralleled the strength of the correlation with the Impairment Index from the Halstead-Reitan Battery. These findings indicate that the VCAT may have some value in clinical neuropsychological assessment.