ABSTRACT
The value of neurocognitive assessment in the clinical management and scientific study of schizophrenia has increased considerably over the past 20 years, as evidenced by the dramatic increase in journal articles and conference presentations on this topic. However, cognitive testing in schizophrenia has a much earlier history. Kraeplin (1920) was the first to observe that patients with “dementia praecox” (i.e., schizophrenia) had cognitive impairments that appeared to progress over time. In 1919, a student of Cattell’s named Shepard Ivory Franz administered the first neuropsychological test battery in a psychiatric hospital (Barr, 2008) By the 1950s, psychologists were regularly using cognitive tests with psychiatric patients to differentiate “functional” from “organic” conditions and to detect brain damage. In fact, Brackbill opined that
… psychologists could make a worth-while contribution to the studies of possible central nervous system pathology among schizophrenics.
(1956, p. 210)