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Introduction: Decision making (DM) is among the most important abilities for everyday functioning. However, the most widely used measures of DM come from behavioral paradigms, whose ecological validity and standalone use has been criticized in the literature. Though these issues could be addressed by the use of DM questionnaires as a complementary assessment method, no such instruments have been validated for use in Brazilian Portuguese. Therefore, the aim of this study was to conduct the translation and validation of the Melbourne Decision Making Questionnaire (MDMQ) for use in a Brazilian population., Methods: The adaptation of the MDMQ involved the following steps: translation, back-translation, expert review and pilot study. These steps were followed by factor analysis and internal consistency measurements, which led to the exclusion of 4 items from the scale. The 18-item version of the MDMQ was then administered to a validation sample consisting of healthy adults, as well as patients with bipolar disorder (BD) and major depressive disorder (MDD)., Results: The instrument displayed good internal consistency, with the hypervigilance subscale showing the lowest, though still acceptable, Cronbach's alpha value. Its factor structure was comparable to that of the original MDMQ according to confirmatory factor analysis. Nevertheless, the MDMQ was sensitive to both depression severity and the presence of MDD and BD, both of which are known to have an impact on DM ability., Conclusion: The version of the MDMQ produced in the present study may be an important addition to neuropsychological assessment batteries with a focus on DM and related abilities.

Objectives: To describe normative data for the Hayling Test and the Trail Making Test (TMT) in a sample of Brazilian adults, and to investigate the effects of age and education on test performance., Method: A total of 313 (TMT) and 364 (Hayling) individuals with age ranges of 19-39, 40-59, and 60-75 years, and with at least 5 years of formal education, participated in this study. The tests were administered as part of a large battery of a normative project. Individuals were evaluated individually in silent, ventilated rooms at a university clinic. Instrument protocols were scored by trained research assistants and double-checked to ensure data reliability., Results: There were major effects of age on the TMT (Time B, Errors B, B-A) and on the Hayling Test (Errors B/15, B/45), and major effects of education on the TMT (Time B, Errors B, B-A) and on the Hayling Test (Time A, Errors B/15, B/45). Interaction effects were found in Time B and B-A for the Hayling Test and in Time A for the TMT., Conclusions: Age and education were critical for performance on both verbal and non-verbal executive functions.

Introduction:: The Hayling Test assesses the components of initiation, inhibition, cognitive flexibility and verbal speed by means of a sentence completion task. This study presents the process of developing the Brazilian version of the Child Hayling Test (CHT) and reports evidence of its content validity., Methods:: 139 people took part in the study. The adaptation was performed by seven translators and 12 specialist judges. An initial sample of 92 healthy children was recruited to test a selection of sentences adapted from previous adult and pediatric versions of the instrument, and a sample of 28 healthy children was recruited for pilot testing of the final version. The instrument was developed in seven stages: 1) translation, 2) back-translation, 3) comparison of translated versions, 4) preparation of new stimuli, 5) data collection with healthy children to analyze comprehension of the stimuli and analyses by the authors against the psycholinguistic criteria adopted, 6) analyses conducted by judges who are specialists in neuropsychology or linguistics, and 7) the pilot study., Results:: Twenty-four of the 72 sentences constructed were selected on the basis of 70-100% agreement between judges evaluating what they assessed and level of comprehensibility. The pilot study revealed better performance by older children, providing evidence of the instrument's sensitivity to developmental factors., Conclusions:: Future studies employing this version of CHT with clinical pediatric populations who have frontal lesions and dysfunctions and in related areas are needed to test functional and differential diagnoses of preserved or impaired executive functions.

This study describes the adaptation of a revised Brazilian version of the Patient Competency Rating Scale (PCRS-R-BR), which focuses on executive, mnemonic, and attention functions. Evidence of content-based and external validity is also reported. The cross-cultural adaptation was conducted in five phases: 1) translations and back translations; 2) item analysis by authors; 3) classification by experts; 4) revisions and reformulations by authors; 5) pilot study with a sample of patients with mild and moderate/severe traumatic brain injury (TBI). Data were analyzed descriptively, and the PCRS-R-BR scores of groups with mild vs. moderate/severe TBI were compared using the Mann-Whitney test. Patients and their relatives were divided into groups and compared using repeated-measures analysis. The results of the PCRS-R-BR questionnaire for relatives and discrepancy scores of patients with moderate/severe TBI revealed significantly more impairment than that found in the group of patients with mild TBI. There were significant differences between item and total scores of both groups of patients and relatives. Results indicated a high level of item content agreement between experts. This study found initial evidence of PCRS-R-BR content-based and external validity when the questionnaire was applied to patients with mild and moderate/severe TBI and their relatives.