Emotional, Cognitive, and Motivational Deficits in Compensation-Seeking, Suspected Brain Injury Cases

Abstract

Emotional distress, neuropsychological impairment, and motivation were measured in a consecutive series of 38 individuals with suspected brain injury who are seeking compensation. Participants had no neurological or neuroradiographic abnormalities, but reported persisting symptoms. One quarter of the participants had significant neuropsychiatric histories. Poor motivation was found in 18% of participants. High rates of neuropsychological impairment (68%) in delayed verbal memory and information-processing capacity and of emotional distress (86%) were found in the remainder. Neuropsychological test scores were not correlated with measures of emotional distress. It is argued that preoccupation with symptomatology and emotional distress are not unique to mild brain trauma but also occur after severe head injury and back injury and relate more to personal interpretation than to objective indicators of injury severity or the injury to the brain itself.