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LAWRENCE G. WEISS, DONALD H. SAKLOFSKE, AURELIO PRIFITERA, and JAMES A. HOLDNACK (Eds.) WISC-IV Advanced Clinical Interpretation Burlington, MA: Elsevier Academic Press, 2006, 448 pages (ISBN 0-12-088763-0, C$49.95 Hardcover)
Reviewed by REBECCA PILLAI RIDDELL
Since the release of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Fourth Edition in 2003 (WISC-IV), a host of accompanying texts have been written with the intent to help clinicians navigate their way through the latest rendition of this gold standard g-factor test. However, what sets this book apart is that it was written by authors heavily involved in the development of the WISC-IV and its associated norms. Wechsler himself stated, regarding the first author, "in so many ways this is his instrument" (Wechsler, 2003, p. iii). With that type of endorsement, perhaps it is appropriate that the authors' express their lofty intention that this book, in conjunction with their earlier tome (WISC-IV Clinical Use and Interpretation, Scientist-Practitioner Perspectives), become the standard reference for all individuals using the WISC-IV. Accordingly, the book aims to provide both graduate students and experienced psychologists with a more nuanced understanding of index and subtest score interpretation.
The first two chapters present basic contextual material for subsequent chapters. Chapter 1 presents interesting background data on African-American and Hispanic-American populations (with a little attention paid to the "Asian" demographic) in terms of physical health status, parental education, income, intellectual stimulation, parental beliefs, and academic preparations provided in the home. The goal of providing this information was to emphasize the need to contextualize a child's WISC-IV performance. The second chapter spends considerable time rehashing information (e.g., how to set up your kit, establishing rapport, what are percentile ranks, testing children who are deaf and hard of hearing), sometimes verbatim, from the WISC-IV manuals. However, new in this chapter is the introduction of their modified strategy to basic profile analysis - a strategy that diverges from Wechsler's manuals. They recommend that analyses be based on the four Index scores and that the Full-Scale IQ (FSIQ) score is included only in the summary of the report (rather than the traditional approach to present it first in the actual body of a report or to state that due to discrepancies the FSIQ is invalid).