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ALSPAC – Age 15.5 – WASI Matrix Reasoning

The Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC) assessed their cohort members (CMs) during the study’s age 15.5 sweep (TeenFocus 3) using the Matrix Reasoning measure from the Wechsler Abbreviated Scale Of Intelligence (WASI).

Details on this measure and the data collected from the CMs are outlined in the table below.


Domain:Non-verbal ability
Measures:Classification and spatial ability
Knowledge of part-whole relationships
Simultaneous processing
Perceptual organization
CHC:Fluid intelligence (Gf)
Visual processing (Gv)
Administration method:Trained interviewer; clinical setting; pen and paper
Procedure:The child was shown an incomplete matrix or visual series and selected the response option (from a possible 5) that completed the matrix or series. Two practice trials were administered followed by 28 real trials.
Link to questionnaire:http://www.bristol.ac.uk/alspac/researchers/our-data/clinical-measures/ (opens in new tab)
Scoring:A single point was awarded for each correct answer. Note (see documentation): WASI scores may underestimate IQ. Raw scores were converted to T-scores using the WASI manual (0 - 60).
Item-level variable(s):Not readily available
Total score/derived variable(s):fh6275, fh6278
Descriptives:Raw scoreT-score
N = 5,277N = 4,956
Range = 2 - 80Range = 20 - 67
Mean = 24.67Mean = 43.68
SD = 7.17SD = 9.15
(click image to enlarge)
(click image to enlarge)
Age of participants:Mean = 185.69 months, SD = 4.24, Range = 171 - 212
Other sweep and/or cohort:BCS70 – Age 10 – BAS Matrices
BCS70 – Age 16 – BAS Matrices
Source:Wechsler, D. (1999). Manual for the Wechsler abbreviated intelligence scale (WASI). San Antonio, TX: The Psychological Corporation.
Technical resources:None
Reference examples:Smithers, L. G., Golley, R. K., Mittinty, M. N., Brazionis, L., Northstone, K., Emmett, P., & Lynch, J. W. (2013). Do dietary trajectories between infancy and toddlerhood influence IQ in childhood and adolescence? Results from a prospective birth cohort study. PLoS One, 8(3), e58904.
Mokrysz, C., Landy, R., Gage, S. H., Munafò, M. R., Roiser, J. P., & Curran, H. V. (2016). Are IQ and educational outcomes in teenagers related to their cannabis use? A prospective cohort study. Journal of Psychopharmacology, 30(2), 159-168.

For the named items in the table above, links are provided to their corresponding content on CLOSER Discovery. Where a variable range is provided, full variable lists can be accessed through the ‘Variable Groups’ tab on the linked Discovery page.


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This page is part of CLOSER’s ‘A guide to the cognitive measures in five British birth cohort studies’.