Relationship between Bender Designs and Basic Living Skills of geriatric psychiatric patients

35 geriatric psychiatric patients were given the Bender-Gestalt and examined on level of Basic Living Skills Assessment. Significant inverse relationships were found between scores on the Bender-Gestalt and five of the seven Basic Living Skills Assessment scales indicating a decrease in patients' functioning with increased visual-motor impairment scores. Skills involving gross motor behaviors were moderately related to poor Bender performance (-.47). These findings suggest the utility of the Basic Living Skills Assessment in identifying the nature and extent of those living skills deficits associated with assessed visual-motor impairment.