Cogstate Brief Battery: Utility for Detecting Feigned and Genuine Cognitive Impairment Following Traumatic Brain Injury

The Cogstate Brief Battery (CBB) includes four computerized cognitive tests that are commonly used to evaluate neuropsychiatric patients, particularly those who have sustained a mild traumatic brain injury (TBI). The current study assessed the CBB’s utility for detecting feigned and genuine cognitive impairment following TBI. CBB performance of TBI patients simulating cognitive impairment (TBI_simulators; n = 24) was compared to that of presumably honest TBI patients (TBI_controls; n = 23). The performance of the latter group was also compared with archival data of healthy controls (Healthy_controls; n = 21). TBI_simulators performed more poorly than TBI_controls in three of the four CBB tasks (Detection, Identification, and One Card Learning), with failure in two or more tasks associated with 95.7% specificity and 66.7% sensitivity. Three CBB tasks, partially overlapping with the earlier mentioned tasks, differentiated TBI_controls and Healthy_controls (Detection, Identification, and One-back). The current study provides initial support for empirically derived CBB-based embedded validity indicators and the utility of the CBB in detecting post-TBI cognitive impairment. Considering the preliminary nature of the study, further research is encouraged.