PAPDI: Prueba Argentina Psicolingüística de Denominación de Imágenes. Construcción y Desarrollo

Abstract

En este trabajo se presenta el diseño y validación de la Prueba Argentina Psicolingüística de Denominación de Imágenes (PAPDI). La misma tiene dos características que la diferencian de las pruebas actualmente disponibles en nuestro medio: a) el hecho de que los estímulos han sido seleccionados y ordenados controlando ciertas variables psicolingüísticas de probada influencia en esta tarea, como Complejidad visual, Concordancia con la Imagen, Variabilidad de la imagen, Familiaridad, Acuerdo en el nombre, Edad de adquisición y Frecuencia de uso, y toman sus valores de normas argentinas; y b) las claves semánticas se han elaborado de acuerdo con normas de producción de atributos semánticos también recolectadas en nuestro país. Se analizaron las propiedades psicométricas mediante el estudio de pacientes con enfermedad de Alzheimer, con lesiones cerebrales focales y participantes sin patología neurológica. Se buscaron evidencias de validez de criterio mediante el análisis de grupos contrastados y la correlación con el test de Boston. A su vez, se estudió la confiabilidad de las puntuaciones por dos métodos: consistencia interna y test-retest. También se analizó la capacidad de discriminación entre pacientes con y sin afasia mediante curvas ROC. Se estudió asimismo la influencia de las variables socio-demográficas. Los resultados indicaron que la PAPDI presenta cualidades psicométricas aceptables para su uso en la clínica.

In the current paper, first part, we present the design and development of the Argentinean Psycholinguistic Image Naming Test (PAPDI). This test has two characteristics that make it different andreini, linares, Fuentes leiza, del Boca y seguí from those currently available in our country: (a) the stimuli have been selected by controlling the variables that affect the stages of visual analysis and image recognition (Visual Complexity and Image Agreement) and conceptual knowledge (Image Variability and Familiarity) of the drawing of the object; and the variables (Frequency of Use and Age of Acquisition) that affect the stage that seeks to evaluate the test were manipulated: activation, selection and retrieval of the lexical label (phonological form of the name), to generate a gradient of difficulty in the items of the test. However, the variable Naming Agreement, that also affects this stage, was controlled to selected pictures with only one predominating name. The quantification of these factors by means of specific variables is influenced by the cultural and linguistic context from which they were obtained, consequently we took their values from Argen- tinean normative data base and (b) semantic cues were elaborated according to semantic feature production norms also from Argentina. The phonological cues corresponded to the first sylable of the object's name. Their use allows to generate more precise hypotheses about the lo- cation of the deficit and allows to infer relevant information about the cognitive profile. There- fore, the process of construction and development of the test is presented, showing how these particularities were taken into consideration, which variables were controlled and which were manipulated, and their justification. For the design of the test 62, black and white pictures were originally selected from the 400 pictures taken from Cycowicz’s set (of frequent use in Experi- mental Psychology and Neuropsychology). They correspond to concrete concepts from different semantic categories belonging to both living and non living domains. The criteria used to include those images were that they were moderately complex (in quantity of lines and details), mod- erately familiar and that they had a mean image variability value. They had to have a medium to high concordance degree between the mental image and its corresponding representation. Be- sides, these images had to have a naming agreement superior to 80%. To conform the first version of the test, the 62 images selected were ordered according to the variable Age of Acquisition and each image was assigned its corresponding semantic and phonological cues. The former were extracted from the Argentinean norms considering the most relevant features. The second consisted on the word ́s first syllable. A pilot study with healthy population (n = 50), of different ages, both sexes and three educational levels, was carried out through which 30 images were selected that constituted the test ́s final version. The deleted items were: figures that did not evoke a univocal response, that is, they were easily con- fused with other objects; figures that had more than one acceptable answer although not all were correct; and items that presented a ceiling effect where the scores accumulated in high scores and did not allow to discriminate the participants' ability to select, retrieve and produce a word (only 25 and 30% of the items were retained). In the test ́s final version, the items were reordered according to the Age of Acquisition and Frequency values and their difficulty in naming (following the percentage of successes in the spontaneous response). And images that were contain in another naming tests were deleted. The test is short enough for use in the clinic and freely accessible. The second part of the paper presents the psychometric studies that provide evidence of their relevance and validity.