An Evaluation of the Equivalence of the Stimulus Subsets of the California Card Sorting Test

Abstract

The California Card Sorting Test (CCST) is a relatively new measure of executive function which seems to hold promise for advancing our understanding of the cognitiveprocesses underlying high level problem-solving ability. Unfortunately, despite its manyadvantages, administration time may be prohibitively long for practical use in many clinical settings. It was hypothesized that the constituent stimulus subsets might be used individually as brief alternatives to the full-length CCST. Interset and set/total correlationswere examined in two groups of subjects (college students, children). Based on the findings of unacceptably low interset correlations, it was concluded that the subsets are notequivalent and should not be treated as interchangeable. However, the generally goodcorrelations between the subset and total test scores indicate that the use of the individual stimulus subsets as "short forms" is justified.