Lab Report 2: SOMCT

S M Ridwan

2011723030

PSY 101L Section- 20

Dr Tasnuva Enam

North South University

INTRODUCTION

Short Orientation Memory Concentration test or SOMCT is a type of psychological test

used to measure a person's cognitive response. SOMCT is used to measure cognitive impairment,

which could find the difference between mild, moderate and severe levels of cognitive defects

(Katzaman et al. 1983). "In addition, several previous studies have used the SOMCT to assess

postoperative cognitive dysfunction after anaesthesia” (Biedler et al., 2000). In this case,

SOMCT can be used to diagnose dementia in a person.

METHOD

Participant:

The experiment was conducted on one participant whom the researcher himself recruited.

The participant was a Bangladeshi male aged around 24 years old.

Materials and design:

The required equipment was a computer, internet connectivity, pen, a piece of paper,

questionnaire, webcams, and headsets to conduct the experiment. The questionnaire titled "Short

Blessed Test (SBT)" was the key element to carry out the experiment. The questionnaire was

divided into six questions, all having individual characteristics. The first question asked the

participant about what the current year was. The second question asked what the current month

was. After that, the participant was asked to repeat the sentence "John Brown, 42 Market Street,

Chicago" thrice and was asked to remember the sentence for a few minutes. The next question

asked the participant what the time was without looking at the clock. For the next question, the
participant was asked to count the numbers from 20 to 1 aloud. Moreover, the fifth question

illustrated that the participant had to tell the months in a year backwards. The sixth question was

that the participant had to tell the exact same name and address he was told to remember a few

minutes earlier.

Procedure:

The researcher, a participant, sat face to face while joining on google meet with the

instructor. Firstly, the participant was introduced and given the consent form, which included

details about the test, the rights and assurance of maintaining the subject's privacy. Upon

scrutinizing the consent form, the participant gave verbal consent to participate in the test. After

that, the test commenced. The participant was asked the first 2 questions about the current year

and month. After that, he was asked to repeat "John Brown, 42 Market Street, Chicago" thrice

and was told to remember it for a few minutes. Then he was asked to tell the time without

looking at the clock. During questions four and five, he was asked to tell the numbers and names

of the months in reverse. Lastly, the test was concluded by asking him to repeat the name and

address he was told to remember a few minutes earlier.

RESULTS:

The participant answered question 2 incorrectly, which made the total score of 3, whereas

the range was from 0 to 28.

DISCUSSION:

The results conclusively show that the participant has normal cognition and is not at risk

of having dementia. However, the experiment was not perfect since there were multiple

limitations. To start, the environment was not controlled. There might have been disruptions
even though the researcher and the participant were sitting in front of each other. Moreover,

there was a selection bias as the participant was not randomly selected and did not affiliate with

the age group susceptible to dementia, which is why it was not an appropriate sample for the test.

However, there was no test-retest effect since the subject was asked whether he had taken the test

before. Hence, the test could have been proper if the participant were chosen from an age group

that is more susceptible to having dementia. This way, the test could have been better.

CONCLUSION:

SOMCT is very helpful in diagnosing dementia in a person. The questionnaire is

comprehensive and is quintessential to detecting mental illness. From the above test, we see a

comprehensive result about the cognition of the test subject.

REFERENCES:

Biedler A, Juckenho¨fel S, Feisel C, Wilhelm W, Larsen R. Cognitive impairment in the early

postoperative period after remifentanil-propofol and sevoflurane-fentanyl anaesthesia.

Anaesthesist. 2000; 49:286–90.

Katzman R, Brown T, Fuld P, Peck A, Schechter R, Schimmel H. Validation of a short

Orientation-Memory-Concentration Test of cognitive impairment. Am J Psychiatry. 1983;

140:734–43.
APPENDIX:
The questionnaire and the scoring is included