Both may be associated with depressed mood and cognitive impairment. 01.AlzheimerвЂ™s disease and depressive disorder are frequent in old age. TABLE 1 WISC DIGIT SPAN PERFORMANCE FOR NINEDIAGNOSTIC GROUPS N Of the eight nonchance F 'Requests for reprints should be sent to Dr. One-way analyses of variance indicated significant differences among groups for all variables except Digits Forward - Backward. These statistics are presented in Table 1. Means and standard deviations were calculated for each diagnostic group for age, Digits Forward, Digits Backward, and the difference between these measures (Forward - Backward). Therefore, the present study of raw score performance not only treats the sexes separately but is also concerned with the relationship between age and performance o n digits. Secondly, a test of the relationship between sex and diagnosis ~ i e l d e d positive results. First, rhere were significant differences in age, for both sexes, among the nine diagnostic categories. In addition to the specific findings concerning Digit Span performance, two other relevant results were reported by W i n n e and Schoonover. Moreover, the pattern of correlations between Digit Span and other WISC subtests and intelligence quotients appears to be the same for both sexes and for all diagnostic groups (Schoonover & Winne, 1975). However, analysis of deviation scores, in which each subject's performance was expressed as a difference between scaled score and a theory-determined intra-individual average ( W i n n e & Gittinger, 1973), ~ i e l d e d negative results. W i n n e and Schoonover ( 1972) found significant differences in performance o n Digit Span among these diagnostic groups only one significant difference was found between sexes. The source and nature of the sample have been defined previously by Schoonover and Hertel ( 1 9 7 0 ). As part of a larger study on the diagnostic implications of WISC scores, the authors have examined several aspecrs of Digit Span performance by 229 male and 92 female children, ages 6 to 16 yr., subdivided into 9 diagnostic categories. Age apparently plays an important role.ДЄlthough the research evidence is very ambiguous, many clinicians tacitly assume that differential performance on Digit Span as compared with other Wechsler subtests and that discrepancies between Digits Forward and Digits Backward have diagnostic significance. Summa~y.-Statistically significant differences in performance on Digits Forward and Digits Backward but not on the difference between these measures were obtained for a sample of 321 children subdivided into 9 diagnostic groups. Psychological Reports 1976ДIAGNOSTIC UTILITY O F WISC DIGITS FORWARD A N D BACKWARD JOHN F.

Digit span forward and backward norms