Velocidad de procesamiento de la información en pruebas neuropsicológicas clásicas e influencia de la edad.

Information processing speed (IPS) is a general capacity of the cognitive system, defined as the sum of the times in which a piece of information is perceived, processed, and a response is prepared and executed. The main goal of this study was to investigate the influence of IPS on performance in classical neuropsychological tests (CNT). Methods: Eleven CNT were applied to an Argentine sample of participants between 15 and 70 years old (M = 40, SD = 17.1, 163 women, 96 men). Results: By means of an exploratory factorial analysis three explanatory factors of performance in the CNT were extracted. These factors were interpreted as 1) cognitive shifting based on motor perception with short-term memory load, 2) semantic processing, and 3) IPS. Significant differences were found between age groups for the influence of each factor on performance. In addition, multiple regression models indicated that the IPS was a significant predictor of performance in nine CNT. Conclusions: These results have implications for the use, design and interpretation of CNT. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]