Comparison of online versus paper versions of cognitive tests in the CamCAN study of adult ageing

We compared the effect of test format – either paper-and-pencil (postal) or online inpeople’s homes – on three common tests of cognitive ability: 1) the Cattell test of fluidintelligence, 2) the Spot-The-Word test of vocabulary knowledge and 3) the LogicalMemory test of immediate and delayed memory for a short story. The effect of format wasassessed in two ways: 1) in a small sample of volunteers across the adult age range whoperformed one-half of the trials in each format, and 2) in a large sample from the CamCANcohort (www.cam-can.org), approximately half of whom experienced either one format orthe other. We found that the Cattell and Spot-The-Word tests showed good agreementacross formats (e.g. using the ICC metric) and no evidence of an interaction with age.However, the Logical Memory test showed poor agreement and interacted with age.