A comprehensive assessment is a powerful tool to help individuals understand themselves, their learning styles, psychological functioning, and to identify their strengths and weaknesses. Community West Testing Center specializes in evaluating diagnoses related to learning based disorders and disabilities, attention based disorders (ADHD), social/emotional functioning, and executive functioning. We work with children, adolescents, and adults offering comprehensive neuropsychological evaluations, psychological and educational testing, as well as consultation services for parents, educators, learning specialists, psychologists, and psychiatrists. Our goal is to help each individual to understand how they can be most successful.
The Testing Center at Community West is directed by Nora Goudsmit, PhD in consultation with the CW Clinical Director, John Grienenberger, PhD. Both Dr. Goudsmit and Dr. Grienenberger attended the clinical psychology doctoral program at the City University of New York where they received extensive training in psychological and neuropsychological assessment. Both also went on to receive extensive post-graduate training in these domains.
Of particular interest at the CW Testing Center is the assessment of complex psychodiagnostic profiles where evaluation is needed of both social/emotional functioning and cognitive/learning issues. The clinical staff at the Testing Center offer in depth evaluation of the interplay between psychological issues and learning challenges, and the way in which these two domains influence each other across the course of development.
Community West Testing Center offers a range of assessments including comprehensive neuropsychological evaluation, psychological evaluation, and psycho-educational testing. We create a specific test battery for each client based on their unique referral questions and use a hypothesis testing model in order to maximize data collection while minimizing the time needed to acquire all the necessary information. By attending to both performance and process, we are able to create a nuanced understanding of the data collected.
A comprehensive neuropsychological evaluation captures multiple domains of functioning. Typically, the process includes an initial intake session to gather history and background, multiple testing sessions (usually between 8-12 hours), an integrative written report, and a feedback session for the client and family. Our integrative report and feedback will help in better understanding the following areas of function: cognitive and intellectual functioning, attention and concentration, executive functioning, motor and perceptual functioning, language, memory and learning, academic functioning and achievement, visuospatial processing, personality, social, behavioral, and emotional functioning.
Once a diagnosis is reached, Community West Testing Center will help the client and family to understand the relevant issues and recommendations. Community West offers comprehensive referral services to treatment centers, psychotherapists, psychiatrists, physicians, and a wide network of other resources.
We maintain an extensive inventory of tests and may utilize additional tests and testing modalities not listed below as necessary:
Achenbach Child Behavior Checklist for Ages 6-18 (CBCL): Rating scales which evaluate a child’s behavioral and emotional functioning, as well as social problems and competencies.
Achenbach Teacher Report Form for Ages 6-18 (TRF): Rating scales which evaluate a child’s behavioral and emotional functioning at school, as well as social problems and competencies.
Auditory Consonant Trigrams: A task used to test levels of memory and attention. The individual listens to a string of three consonants (the trigram) immediately followed by a mental task such as counting backwards. The individual is then asked to recall the trigram.
Behavior Assessment System for Children – Third Edition – (BASC-3): A comprehensive set of rating scales that identifies behaviors and emotions of children and adolescents on clinically meaningful scales.
Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI): A brief self-report measure that examines responses about anxiety and the implications for functioning.
Beck Depression Inventory – Second Edition – (BDI-II): A brief self-report measure that examines responses about depression and the implications for functioning.
Beck Hopelessness Scale (BHS): A brief self-report measure that examines responses about hopelessness and its implications for suicidal ideation and intent.
Beery-Buktenica Visual-Motor Integration Test, Fifth Edition (VMI-5): A task where twelve gestalt figures of various levels of difficulty are copied in order to assess visual-motor skills.
Brief Rating Inventory of Executive Function – Second Edition – (BRIEF-2): Assesses executive function and self-regulation in children and teens.
Brown ADD Scales: A self-report measure, which offers exploration of the executive cognitive functioning aspects of cognition associated with Attention Deficit Disorder across the lifespan.
California Verbal Learning Test – Third Edition – Adult Version (CVLT-3):
This test is comprised of a word-list and forced-recognition trial used to assess multi-trial learning, serial-position information, semantic organization, and other aspects of verbal learning and recall.
California Verbal Learning Test – Children’s Edition – (CVLT-C): This test is comprised of a word-list and forced-recognition trial used to assess multi-trial learning, serial-position information, semantic organization, and other aspects of verbal learning and recall.
Children’s Sentence Completion Test: A projective measure designed to elicit feelings, attitudes, and beliefs.
Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processing: An individually administered assessment battery that measures the aspects of phonological awareness, phonological memory, and rapid naming
Conners’ Continuous Performance Test II (CPT-II): A task designed to measure sustained attention and yields response patterns that suggest inattentiveness, impulsivity, activation/arousal problems, and difficulties maintaining vigilance.
Delis-Kaplan Executive Functioning System (D-KEFS): A measure of executive functions including sequencing, inhibition, attention, and alternating focus.
- Trail Making Tests 1-5: Visual conceptual and visuo-grapho-motor tracking tasks on paper which assess visual scanning, number sequencing, letter sequencing, number-letter switching, and motor speed.
- Verbal Fluency: Word list generation of (1) each of three letters, (2) two categories, and (3) two alternating categories to test fluency.
- Design Fluency (3 conditions): Tasks measure ability to draw as many different designs as possible within 60 seconds, shifting among filled dots, empty dots, and switching conditions. Provides information on motor speed and visual-perceptual skills, and ability to problem-solve and generate creative visual patterns.
- Color Word Interference Test (4 conditions): Tasks designed to measure ability to shift between conflicting verbal response modes by assessing color naming, word reading, inhibition, and inhibition switching conditions.
- Twenty Questions: Four items designed to assess categorical processing.
- Tower Test: Nine items designed to assess spatial planning.
Draw-a-Person (DAP): A projective drawing test designed to assess personality functioning.
Halstead Reitan Speech Sounds Perception and Rhythm Test: A neuropsychological assessment designed to evaluate auditory attention, concentration and discrimination.
House-Tree-Person (HTP): A projective drawing test designed to assess personality functioning.
Kinetic Family Drawing (KFD): A projective drawing test designed to assess elements of personality and family functioning.
Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory – 2 (MMPI-2): This is a clinical personality assessment tool designed to assess emotional functioning and psychopathology.
Nelson-Denny Reading Test, (NDRT): This timed test is composed of two subtests, Vocabulary and Comprehension, and is used to provide an assessment of an individual’s ability in three areas of academic achievement: vocabulary, reading comprehension, and reading rate.
Personality Assessment Inventory (PAI): This is a clinical personality assessment tool designed to assess emotional functioning and diagnostic categories in adults.
Personality Assessment Inventory – Adolescent Version (PAI-A): This is a clinical personality assessment tool designed to assess emotional functioning and diagnostic categories in adolescents.
Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure Test (RCFT): Copy, immediate recall, and recall after 30 minutes of a complex figure to assess ability to perceptually organize and recall complex visual material.
Roberts Apperception Test for Children – Second Edition (Roberts-2): A projective measure designed to assess perception and personality functioning.
Rorschach: A projective measure designed to assess perception and personality functioning.
Sentence Completion: A brief projective measure to elicit feelings, attitudes, and beliefs.
Spadafore Diagnostic Reading Test (SDRT): A standardized assessment of reading skills.
Thematic Apperception Test (TAT): A standardized projective test to assess personality functioning through the process of storytelling about 16 specific pictures representing possible situations an adult would encounter.
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale – Fourth Edition (WAIS-IV): A standardized intelligence test yielding Verbal Comprehension, Perceptual Reasoning, Working Memory, Processing Speed, and Full Scale indices and intelligence quotient scores. These quotients and indices are derived from 10 subtests and 5 supplementary subtests.
Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children – Fourth Edition (WISC-IV): A standardized intelligence test for children yielding Verbal Comprehension, Perceptual Reasoning, Working Memory, Processing Speed, and Full Scale indices and intelligence quotient scores. These quotients and indices are derived from 10 subtests and 5 supplementary subtests.
Wide Range Achievement Test- Third Edition (WRAT-3): A standardized achievement test that assesses basic academic skills.
Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST): Provides a versatile measure of neuropsychological functioning, assessing abstract thinking, cognitive flexibility, executive function, and impairment.
Woodcock-Johnson IV Tests of Achievement – Fourth Edition (WJIV ACH): A multi-subject instrument containing 22 tests measuring five curricular areas: reading, mathematics, written language, oral language, and academic language used to assess academic abilities.