NIH Toolbox

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 NIH Toolbox Executive Summary

There is little uniformity among the measures used to assess neurological function and behavioral health. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Toolbox initiative seeks to assemble brief, comprehensive assessment tools that will be useful to clinicians and researchers in a variety of settings, with a particular emphasis on measuring outcomes in longitudinal epidemiologic studies and prevention or intervention trials across the lifespan. Such measures are rarely included in studies of this type, due in part to the lack of brief, well-validated instruments.

 

The Toolbox will provide a valuable resource across NIH and the scientific community, by ensuring that assessment methods will be capable of comparison with existing and completed studies. Advances in psychometric research methodology, including computerized adaptive testing and virtual reality, combined with traditional performance-based tools, should lead to the efficient, flexible and responsive assessment of Cognition (such as learning, memory, executive function, language/lexical retrieval, visuospatial abilities, attention, speed of processing); Emotion (mood, adaptability, interpersonal relations, self- regulation); Motor Functioning (locomotion, non-vestibular balance, dexterity, strength); and Sensation (vision, hearing, vestibular balance, smell, taste, touch).

 

The NIH Toolbox for Assessment of Neurological and Behavioral Function is a contract funded by the Institutes and Centers that comprise the NIH Blue print for Neuroscience Research. The Toolbox project is operated by the NorthShore University HealthSystem Research Institute, Evanston, IL, under the leadership of Richard Gershon, Ph.D., Principal Investigator, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL

 

The Toolbox initiative commenced on September 30, 2006 and is structured in two phases, to be completed in 5 years:

 

Phase I (24 months) Identification of criteria for acceptance of cognitive, emotional, sensory and motor function domain specific tasks to the behavioral and neurological research communities.

  • Expert Survey of potential criteria
  • Scientific Advisory Board (SAB) meeting to select final criteria (Month 4) Identification of existing psychometric tests and measurement tools
  • Focus group interviews with patients
  • Interviews with lifespan-approach scientists engaged in large cohort, pre-clinical and clinical studies
  • Identification of initial comprehensive domains and tests (Consensus Meeting Month 9)
  • Development assignments distributed to domain sites
  • Selection of initial sets of items from existing instruments and development of new items for adults and children

Phase II (36 months) testing and refinement of the final toolbox for adults ages 18-85, including evaluation of different modes of administration and of longitudinal use of the instrument.

  • Spanish Translation
  • Pre-testing and revision of technician assisted performance measures
  • Calibration & Analysis of item bank based Measures
  • Field testing of toolbox in clinical populations
  • Option to conduct all of the Phase II activities for pediatric populations as well

For additional information please contact Richard C. Gershon, PhD, Principal Investigator (gershon@northwestern.edu).

 NIH Project Director
  Molly Wagster, PhD, is Chief of the Behavioral and Systems Neuroscience Branch in the Division of Neuroscience at the National Institute on Aging (NIA), National Institutesof Health (NIH), Bethesda, Maryland. Dr. Wagster oversees administration and development of research in cognitive and emotional change with age and in sensory and motor disorders of aging. She directly manages a portfolio of research in mechanisms of cognitive (memory, learning, attention, language) and affective (emotion) change with age that spans research from molecules to behavior. She serves as the NIH Project Officer for the development of the NIH Toolbox for Assessment of Neurological and Behavioral Function (contract supported by the NIH Blueprint for Neuroscience Research) and directs the trans-NIH Cognitive and Emotional Health Project.

Dr. Wagster came to the NIA from the Department of Pathology, Division of Neuropathology, at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. For over a decade, Dr. Wagster investigated neural mechanisms of learning and memory changes with age in animal models and studied changes in neuroreceptor mechanisms in relation to cognitive decline in neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease and Huntington’s disease. Her research interests centered on individual differences with age in cognitive domains. Dr. Wagster held a joint appointment in the Department of Psychology at The Johns Hopkins University (JHU). During her tenure at JHU, she was responsible for the instruction and curricular development of courses in psychopharmacology, the biological basis of learning and memory, introductory psychology, and psychology of aging.

Dr. Wagster received her MS and PhD in Biopsychology from Tulane University and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Neuropathology at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine.
National Institute of Child Health & Human Development National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine National Institutes of Health National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders National Institutes of Neurological Disorders and Stroke National Institutes of Environmental Health Sciences National Eye Institute National Institute of Aging National Institute of Mental Health National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism National Institute of Drug Abuse The Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research
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