Some caveats in using the Rey 15-Item Memory Test to detect malingered amnesia.

A procedure devised to detect malingered amnesia has received increasing attention as a useful clinical method to identify exaggerated claims of memory impairment. However, none of the published studies regarding its utility has included subjects faking amnesia or genuine amnesics. In this study, we administered the Rey 15-1tem Memory Test to 76 subjects faking various mental disorders, 148 patients with amnesia, dementia, severe mental illness, or another neuropsychiatric disorder, and 80 normal control subjects. Performance was found to correlate highly with IQ (r = .55) and Mini-Mental State Examination scores (r = .81). Fewer than 15% of subjects faking mental disorders were identified by this procedure, and 27% of patients scored in the range. Problems with the uncritical application of cutoffscores to detect malingering with this procedure are discussed.