Diagnostic Value of the "Table Drawing" Technique during Neuropsychological Assessment of Children Aged 4–17 Years

The method of "Table Drawing" is used in child neuropsychology to evaluate projective representations. At the same time, a unified system for assessing the technique performance, age standards, and information about the validity are absent. The present study aimed to investigate the diagnostic value of the technique during the neuropsychological examination of children aged 4–17 years. A survey of 636 persons was conducted, 411 of them boys and 225 girls. The overall technique performance was evaluated in the diagnostic process. Regardless of the diagnostician, the drawings were evaluated by the level of projective representations and the geometric properties. Age standards of technique execution were obtained. Based on the material of 597 diagnostic protocols, the contribution of the state of 14 higher mental functions and psychological characteristics to the success of the test performance was studied. Constructive-spatial functions have the greatest weight; however, the efficiency also depends on visual gnosis, dynamic praxis, and thinking. The diagnostic value of the method is different at different ages, so neuropsychological interpretation of its execution results should depend on the age of the subject.

Dynamics of Praxis Functions in the Context of Maturation of the Parietal and Frontal Brain Regions in the Period 4-6 Years of Age

In recent years, child neuropsychology has paid special attention to ontogenesis and trends in the development of practical functions during the preschool period, given their relationship to practical skills and children’s readiness to learn. On the other hand, the dynamics of complex types of praxis is an indicator of the integration between the brain regions responsible for the perception, programming and recoding of motor patterns. The article presents a comparative analysis of data from a study of two types of praxis functions (dynamic praxis and spatial postural praxis) in children with typical development in the period 4–6 years. The specificity of the performance of neuropsychological tests is an indicator of the functioning and the degree of neuronal connectivity of the parietal and premotor regions of the left hemisphere. The data from the study show a similar trend in the dynamics of the studied functions and the influence on them of three independent factors: age, social conditions (type of settlement) and gender. Significant improvement in the performance of the tasks is observed in children at the age of 6, which is a reason to consider this age as critical for the maturation and neurophysiological connectivity of the structures of the parietal and premotor regions. The assessment of complex types of praxis in this period is an objective indicator of the neuropsychological development of children and has an indisputable prognostic effect for future learning disorders.

Gender Disparities in the Author Bylines of Articles Published in Clinical Neuropsychology Journals from 1985 to 2019

Objective: Women are becoming more prevalent in clinical neuropsychology, but gender bias and disparities persist across multiple professional domains. This study examined potential gender disparities in historical authorship trends across commonly read journals in clinical neuropsychology. Method: Analyses were conducted on 10,531 articles published in six clinical neuropsychology journals from 1985 to 2019. Each author was coded as either a man or a woman using the OpenGenderTracking Project database. Results: On average, women comprised 43.3% ( 30.6) of the authors listed in clinical neuropsychology article bylines and were lead and/or corresponding author on 50.3% of these papers. Findings varied by journal, with Child Neuropsychology having the best representation of women across several study metrics. Women comprised an increasing proportion of authors over time and the gender gap in clinical neuropsychology is smaller than was recently reported for the broader field of psychology; nevertheless, the recent rates of female authorship lag behind the prevalence of women in clinical neuropsychology. Encouragingly, gender was not associated with the number of times an article was cited. Articles that included women in leadership roles had significantly more authors overall and specifically more women authors. Conclusions: Women are under-represented as authors in clinical neuropsychology journals, but they are becoming more common and their papers are cited just as frequently as their male colleagues. Efforts to increase women as research mentors and sponsors may help to further close the publishing gender gap in clinical neuropsychology.

Proposal for Development of Spatial Functions at Pre-school Age on the Basis of Neuropsychological Analysis of Graphic Activity

Child neuropsychology should be considered as a branch of general neuropsychology. Goals and tasks of child neuropsychology depend on a general psychological approach to the development. According to historical and cultural approach, neuropsychology as a science is directed not only towards assessing difficulties and establishing a diagnosis, but also towards creating methods for overcoming developmental problems and preventing such problems. Cultural and historical conception of development allows to study each psychological age according to a predominant type of child’s activity. In case of pre-school age, the predominant activity is a role-play. This activity is extremely useful for child’s development, but not enough for preparation to school. Play activity is performed in groups by communicative and precise material means (toys, objects and symbols). Another kind of useful activity is creative drawing as activity performed at a perceptive level and achieved by perceptive means. The aim of the article is to propose a way for introduction and gradual development of spatial orientation at a perceptive level within the content of original program for drawing. Neuropsychological analysis of drawing activity allows to specify brain mechanisms of the functional system of the action of drawing. The content of the functional system of the drawing action is presented together with the stages for introduction and formation of this action. The authors discuss the usefulness of graphic activity for the development of spatial orientation at a perceptive level. Graphic activity should be broadly used in pre-school institutions as a basic method for formation of spatial analysis and synthesis and prevention of learning disabilities at school.

Influence of Neuropsychological Development of Children on Their Verbal Abilities

Learning disabilities in childhood are often caused by certain delays in language and higher mental functions development. So nowadays comprehensive research of child language development and its neuropsychological base is of great demand. The objective of the present study was to discover relationships between children’s age, certain characteristics of speech production, neuropsychological and neurolinguistic development. 126 students (51 first-graders and 75 second-graders) were recruited. They underwent complete neuropsychological assessment along with the trial “Creating a Story based on the series of pictures”. The results show that age is an important factor of neuropsychological development from the first to second grade. It concerns especially frontal lobe development. Neuropsychological development also correlates with neurolinguistical level: children who are better at programming and control, analytic and holistic strategies would be more successful in the trial “Creating a Story based on the series of pictures”, their speech would be more correct lexically as well as grammatically and syntactically. We also show that speech particularitiesand their correlation with neuropsychological indexes would vary in first- and second grades. Keywords: Lurian neuropsychology; child neuropsychology; neurolinguistics; neuropsychological development; Creating a Story based on the series of pictures; speech.