Cross-Cultural Diagnostic Applicability of the Pictogram Test

Abstract

The aim of this study was to determine whether the Pictogram Test (PT; Vygostsky, 1960) a test of logical memory that was developed in Russia, is applicable for diagnosing and understanding thought disturbances in schizophrenia within an English-speaking population. Participants included 62 patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorders and 80 community nonpatients from Russia and the United States. We used correlational analysis to organize PT variables into Concrete (CI), Attribute (AI), and Geometric (GI) indexes. Discriminant function analysis revealed that only AI and GI had significant discriminatory power. These indexes correctly classified 91% of English-speaking and 86% of Russian-speaking participants as either patients or nonpatients. Controlling for age and education, multivariate analysis revealed that patients had significantly lower AI and significantly higher GI scores relative to nonpatients, and those differences were similar across languages. These results indicate that the PT can discriminate between patients with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorders and nonpatients, which suggests that characteristics of the PT could be used to understand the mechanism of logical thinking in patients and nonpatients.

Acknowledgments

We thank Jason Weimer and Drs. Aboraya, Cutlip, Adel, and Mogge for facilitating data collection in the United States. We thank Svetlana Voskoboinikova, Thomas Campbell, Konstantin Lyavdansky, and Rebecca Mestemacher for their help with translation of the test. We greatly appreciate Paul W. Gately for his invaluable editing of the final version of this article. Finally, we thank Drs. Marinelli, Walls, DeLo, and Morgan for their comments, suggestions, and guidance. Research findings are based on the doctoral dissertation of Luba Leontieva, who was awarded the Certificate of Merit for outstanding student research from The Division of International Psychology of the American Psychological Association, July 2004. This article was presented at the 114th Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association (New Orleans, LA, August 2006).

Notes

^a n = 41.

^b n = 39.

^c n = 31.

^d n = 31.

^e Ukrainian, Byelorussian, Armenian, Korean, Tatar, Bashkir (for Russian-speaking participants, primary language was Russian); Indian, Turkish, Pakistani, Brazilian, Venezuelan (for English-speaking participants, primary language was English).

^a Based on frequencies in this sample and Russian norms (Leontieva, 2005; Khersonsky, 2000).

∗ p < .05 (two-tailed).

^a n = 80.

^b n = 62.

∗p < .05 indicated in bold (two-tailed).

^a n = 80.

^b n = 62.

∗ p < .05 indicated in bold (two-tailed).