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The Wechsler Memory Scale—Revised

Current Status and Applications

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Advances in Psychological Assessment

Part of the book series: Advances in Psychological Assessment ((AIPA,volume 7))

Abstract

In 1945 David Wechsler published the Wechsler Memory Scale (WMS) as “a rapid, simple, and practical memory examination” (p. 87). His explicit purpose was to develop a quantitative scale that would assist clinicians in evaluating patients’ memory functions in relation to their other cognitive abilities. While the WMS was never intended to be a comprehensive measure of memory function, it was widely accepted and quickly became the clinical standard for memory assessment. Despite a long list of conceptual and psychometric issues that arose over the years concerning the content and structure of the WMS (Erickson & Scott, 1977; Prigatano, 1978), it has remained the most frequently used standardized measure of memory function (Chelune, Ferguson, & Moehle, 1986; Seretny, Dean, Gray, & Hartlage, 1986).

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Chelune, G.J., Bornstein, R.A., Prifitera, A. (1990). The Wechsler Memory Scale—Revised. In: Advances in Psychological Assessment. Advances in Psychological Assessment, vol 7. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-0555-2_3

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