Quick and easy Executive Function Test

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They actually do adjust for age, although I am not sure what kind of formula they use to adjust for age. I know someone else (not on this forum) who got the same score I did on executive function - but he's in his 20s and I am in my early 40s, right? So we both scored 30, but his score was standardized to 69 and mine to 81. He ended up in the 2nd percentile and I ended up in the 10th percentile.

Someone else whose age I do not know scored: 39 on the verbal memory, standard score 58. I got 38, standard score 52. She didn't say what her percentile was, however. I am not sure the 1 point difference on the first score really translates to a six point difference on the second score on a flat scale that isn't normed, but I could be mistaken.

Another woman who is approximately 20 years older than I am scored significantly higher than I did (above average, although she didn't reveal her scores).

Since hardly anyone is sharing their subject scores and standard scores, it's really difficult to say one way or the other.

I had five:

Sparrow
Swallow
Seagull
Swan
Salamander

I only thought of "Sparrow" and "Swan" because of Pirates of the Caribbean and Black Swan.

Initially I was in a panic trying to work out how to guage a minute accurately then realised that altho I can't see the wallclock from the pc I could just walk over and then think while I watched it - straight away I got Snake then blanked! - at the 50 second mark I suddenly got Sparrow and Shark and time was up - so score three. I kept having images of Giraffes and Elephants pop into my head which didn't help! (the sparrow landed on the Giraffe and the Elephant being grey made me think of shark).

Seeing other people's lists has been Du-OH! I think working out the timing threw me out. If the test screen had a reducing bar and the instruction was think of as many before the bar drops to zero would that not be a better form of test?

This test seems a little bogus. Has anyone ever had to do this before? The first time you do anything you'll blunder around until you get the hang of it. If I could take practice tests and rehearse it, I could max this out. How many times in life have you ever had to make a list of animals not connected to each other in any way other than the initial letter of their names? No one is trained to do that. Would it be easy for anyone, autistic or not?

This test would be like asking a basketball player how many times he could dribble underwater in a minute or something. Or asking a software developer to list the keywords of a programming language in alphabetical order.

I agree....the test would be skewed in favour of those who like certain kinds of word games. Personally I have no great interest in word games, and would only play them to humour people. The other problem is that the correlation between general executive function and the specialised word knowledge necessary to succeed in this test is questionable to say the least.
Seems to me more like a quick and dirty test than a quick and easy one. But it's fun, if you like word games.

I thought of nine: snake, scorpion, shark, seagull, spider, sea lion, sparrow, salamander, and snail.

snake, salamander, spider, sloth and then nothing - why did my brain lock up like that? Reading through other's replies I can see dozens that I should have known

salamander, saber tooth cat, snake, sea lion, sea turtle, sea horse, and four more that I already forgot about.

I got 7. Don't remember what they were, though. I could tell when I came back to one I'd already had, and I counted on my fingers to keep track of the number. I may have gone a bit over time without noticing though.

I got 6, but kept getting distracted by sounds that weren't leading to animals.
Seal, Snake, Salamander, Sloth, Snail, Saber tooth tiger (not in that order)


But I know I would have done better if I didn't know i was being timed. I was trying to rush rather than just listing what came to mind, and that always causes me to lock up and not come up with things. I'd be curious how I'd do if I was asked to list something if I didn't know I was being timed, because I think I would do drastically better.

AS, no ADHD.

This is one of the tests my neuropsychologist had me take; I did very poorly. I thought I might do better this time-it seems like it should be so easy- I still only got 2 in the minute. Oh well. The idea that I have executive dysfunction is really not a big shocker to me.

I thought of snake first and got stuck on that - managed to come up with sloth, then I saw a bird and though sea-eagle. Spent the rest of the time trying to decide if I could use sea-eagle and seagull as seperate animals, or whether they were just sub-categories of birds and didn't count as different animals.

I also had issues because I don't have a clock in front of me with seconds to measure the minute precisely, but if I stopped to find another clock I would have used up part of the minute...


This reminded me a lot of the word association tests you get - what's the first word that you think of when I say "snake"? I'll just think "snake" over and over, and they think I am being difficult on purpose.

Snake, sloth, steer (okay, so that one was a bit iffy >.>), snowy owl, seal, snow leopard, snail, snipe and stork. I got the sn combinations down pretty well, but I'm a bit embarrassed that I failed to get sharks and scorpions. So much for them being among my favourite animals.

I'm also a bit surprised that so few people got sheep.

Edit: only got 6 in Dutch, and most of them were from this thread too. My first language appears to be slipping.

Snake, skunk, skink, squirrel, scorpion, salamander, salmon, seal, sloth, shark,

I had to write them down as I thought of them to avoid repeats.
Scorpion, salmon and shark are iffy in my mind, so it's either 7 or 10.

What I find interesting is that there seems to be a phonetic progression from word to word.
Snake -> skunk
skunk -> skink,
skink -> squirrel
squirell -> scorpion
scorpion -> salamander
salamander -> salmon,
salmon -> seal
seal-> sloth

I stalled out here and then came up with "shark" out of the flow. If I'd landed on snail off of seal, I probably would have had a few more.

I'll have to play with this and see if other lists end up organizing this way in my head or if I'm just seeing a pattern where there really isn't one.

Only four...I kept getting invaded with syllables that kept repeating and didn't go anywhere.
Also, the ones I thought of kept coming up again after I had already thought of them. It was annoying.

I got 4: sheep, shrimp, snake and salmon

I should have known dozens, but I'm hungry and all I can think right now is food. OK I don't eat snakes but they're my favorite animal.