Conners Continuous Auditory Test of Attention

The Conners Continuous Auditory Test of Attention™ (Conners CATA™) assesses auditory processing and attention-related problems in individuals aged 8 years and older. By indexing the respondent’s performance in areas of inattentiveness, impulsivity, and sustained attention, the Conners CATA can be used to evaluate attention disorders and neurological functioning. The Conners CATA provides objective information about an individual’s performance in attention tasks, complementing information obtained from rating scales such as the Conners 3.

The Conners CATA can be used in conjunction with the Conners Continuous Performance Test 3rd Edition™ (Conners CPT 3™) which is a task-oriented computerized assessment of attention-related problems in individuals aged 8 years and older. The Conners CATA and Conners CPT 3 can be purchased as a combo kit or individually. Click here to learn more about the Conners CPT 3.

• A comprehensive evaluation with the introduction of an auditory attention test and used alongside the Conners CPT 3. Learn more about the Conners CPT 3.
• Easy interpretation with new reports offering clear visuals and summaries.
• Trusted results with the most representative CPT normative samples collected.
• Easy to understand clinical likelihood statements are based on T-scores and displayed as very high, high, moderate, or minimal.

Quick Review of the Conners CATA:

• 200 trials
• Two types of trials and sounds:
  • Warned Trials: low tone, followed by the high tone
  • Unwarned Trials: high tone by itself, without warning
• Dimensions of Auditory Attention Measured: Inattentiveness, Impulsivity, Sustained Attention
• Descriptive information about the respondent's Auditory Laterality and Mobility
• Results can be broken down into blocks to track the respondent's performance over the course of the test.

How to Use the Assessment

During the 14-minute, 200-trial administration, respondents are presented with high-tone sounds that are either preceded by a low-tone warning sound (warned trials) or played alone (unwarned trials). Respondents are instructed to respond only to high-tone sounds on warned trials, and to ignore those on unwarned trials. On most trials, the low-tone and the high-tone sounds are played in the same ear (non-switch trials). On switch trials, the low-tone warning sound and the high-tone target sound are played in different ears, requiring the respondent to shift auditory attention from one ear to the other.

The Conners CATA is available as an unlimited use program. The number of computers that can use the program is limited to the number of installations purchased.

Scoring and Interpretation

The Most Representative CPT Normative Samples Collected

The normative sample consists of 1,080 cases and is representative of the United States (U.S.) population in terms of key demographic variables such as gender, race, geographical region, and parental education level.

Reliability

Users can be confident that the Conners CATA will yield consistent and stable scores across administrations.

Internal Consistency

One measure of a test’s internal consistency is split-half reliability, which has been previously used to establish the reliability of other continuous performance tests. Split-half reliability estimates of the Conners CATA scales were calculated for the normative and clinical samples. Results were very strong – across all scores, the median split-half reliability estimate was .95 for the norm and clinical samples (all correlations were significant, p < .001). These results indicate that the Conners CATA demonstrates excellent internal consistency for both the normative and the clinical groups.

Test-Retest Reliability

Test-retest reliability refers to the consistency of scores obtained from the same respondent on separate occasions over a specified period of time. To estimate the test-retest reliability of the Conners CATA, a sample of 69 respondents from the general population completed the Conners CATA twice with a 1- to 4-week interval between administrations. The median test-retest correlation was .64. These results suggest a good level of test-retest reliability.

Validity

Users can be assured that the Conners CATA will help detect attention deficits and differentiate Clinical from Non-Clinical Cases.

Discriminative Validity

Discriminative validity pertains to an instrument’s ability to distinguish between relevant participant groups (i.e., the test’s ability to differentiate between clinical and non-clinical groups). In order to conduct discriminative validity analyses, Conners CATA data were collected during the standardization process from 193 children and adults who had an existing ADHD diagnosis. Conners CATA scores from this ADHD sample were compared to a matched sample from the general population. Results indicated that differences were found between the ADHD sample and the matched general population sample on most measures with small to moderate effect sizes (d = 0.10 to 0.63). As expected, the ADHD sample demonstrated poorer performance (i.e., they had higher scores on the Conners CATA). In particular, the ADHD sample had lower d′ scores, indicating that they had more difficulty in distinguishing between target trials and non-target trials than did the general population sample. Similarly, the ADHD sample made a greater number of errors (i.e., they had higher percentages Commissions and Perseverative Commissions than did the general population sample) and showed more variability in their responses (i.e., higher HRT SD scores, when compared to the matched general population sample).

Incremental Validity

Another approach in establishing the Conners CATA’s validity is to show how it works together with other measures of similar constructs in the assessment of attention problems. To assess such validity, samples were collected in which cases were scored on the Conners CATA and other measures of attention. Specifically, in a sample of 112 youth, parent-reports on the Conners 3rd Edition (Conners 3-P) were collected in addition to their scores on the Conners CATA and the Conners CPT 3. Logistic regressions were conducted in order to determine how well scales from the Conners CATA improve the diagnostic efficacy of the Conners 3-P and Conners CPT 3 in predicting group membership into ADHD or general population groups. Results are presented in the table below. When the Conners 3-P, Conners CPT 3, and Conners CATA scores were considered together, there was an overall correct classification rate (i.e., the ability to accurately predict group membership) of 93.8%, sensitivity (i.e., the ability to correctly detect ADHD cases) of 94.7%, and specificity (i.e., the ability to correctly detect general population cases) of 92.7%. These values were 9.9%, 8.7%, and 10.9%, respectively, higher than when the rating scale was used on its own. Furthermore, the Conners CATA added increased classification accuracy over and above the Conners 3-P and Conners CPT 3.

Easy to Read Reports:

The computer-generated scoring reports have been designed to guide assessors through each step of the recommended interpretation process.

• • Easy to follow look and feel.
    
    
  • Review data more efficiently with clear visuals.
    
    

• • Interpretive text to complement and narrate the wealth of data.
    
    

• Easy to understand Clinical Likelihood Statements are based on the number of atypical T-scores to estimate the likelihood of a clinical disorder.
  
  

There are two report types available:

• Assessment Report, which provides detailed results from a single administration
• Progress Report, which provides an overview of change over time by combining and comparing results of up to four administrations.

The system requirements are:

• x86 processor 1.0ghz - class computer or higher
• Windows 2000 Service Pack 3 or higher
• Windows XP computers should have Service Pack 2 or higher installed for the Microsoft .NET Framework v2.0
• MDAC 2.6 or higher
• 1 gigabyte of RAM memory or higher
• 500 megabytes of hard disk space
• USB 2.0 port

Common Question:

Q: Can I use the Conners CPT 3 and the Conners CATA on an Apple computer running OS X?

A: No, the software will not work unless the computer is running Windows as its operating system.

System Requirements

• Intel Core i3 or equivalent performance
• 2 GB of Ram
• Windows XP or higher
• 1 USB Port

This product is not compatible with MAC.