The CERAD Neuropsychological Battery, includes 7
measures: Verbal Fluency; Modified Boston Naming;
Mini-Mental State: Word List Learning, Recall and
Recognition; Constructional Praxis. It was
originally developed to evaluate patients with a
clinical diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease, but is
increasingly used in epidemiological studies of the
incidence and prevalence of dementia in the elderly.
The current study reports norms for African American
and White representative community residents 71
years of age and older in North Carolina, and
compares performance with that of African Americans
in Indianapolis and with Whites in the Monongahela
Valley, Pennsylvania. For all 3 studies, increased
education and younger age was related to better
performance on each of the 7 measures. Sex
differences, when present, tended to favor women.
Although on average African Americans performed more
poorly than Whites, with demographic characteristics
controlled, no significant racial differences were
found in the North Carolina sample. Both African
American and White participants in North Carolina
performed more poorly than their racial counterparts
in the other 2 studies, possibly because of
selection-induced differences in health and
educational status. Nevertheless, the use of an
identical evaluation battery, such as the CERAD
neuropsychologic instrument, facilitates comparisons
not otherwise possible, and should be encouraged.