The Bender Gestalt Test (BGT) is a screening tool developed in 1938 to assess visual-motor and visuoconstructive abilities. It involves copying simple line drawings and is used to evaluate neurological and developmental deficits. The test demonstrates good reliability, with interscorer reliability for errors ranging from .87 to .90. Validity is also good as an indicator of perceptual-motor development, with error scores decreasing with age. While brief, economical, and flexible to administer, the BGT provides only limited information about specific brain damage and lacks a universally accepted scoring system.

1. Bender Gestalt
Test(BGT)
By
Muhammad Musawar Ali
MPHIL, ICAP
1

2. Background
The original Bender Visual Motor Gestalt test was
developed in 1938 by psychiatrist Lauretta Bender.
2

3. Purpose
• used as a screening device for neuropsychological
impairment by assessing a client’s
visuoconstructive abilities
• to evaluate visual-motor maturity and to screen
children for developmental delays.
• to assess brain damage and neurological deficits.
3

4. Reliability
• interscorer reliability for the 12 organic signs has
been found to range between .87 and .90 (Lacks,
2000).
• Test retest reliabilities over a 3- to 12-month
interval were .79
• test-retest reliabilities over a four-month interval
were somewhat low (.58 to .66; Koppitz, 1975;
Neale & McKay, 1985).
4

5. Validity
• Validity is rather good as an index of perceptual-
motor development because error scores decrease
with age, between the ages of 5 and 9 (Koppitz,
1963, 1975).
• Concurrent measures of visual-motor perception
also suggest a moderate level of validity
5

6. Versions
• Bender-Gestalt test
• Modified Version of the Bender-Gestalt test for
Preschool and Primary School Children
• the Bender Visual Motor Gestalt test for Children
• the Bender-Gestalt test for Young Children
6

7. Requirements
• A blank 8.5-by-11-inch sheet of paper
• Pencil
• A sharpened backup pencil should be available
• Pencils should include erasers
7

8. Administration
• The following verbal directions are recommended
as a standard procedure:
• I am going to show you these cards, one at a time.
Each card has a simple drawing on it. I would like
you to copy the drawing on the paper, as well as
you can. Work in any way that is best for you. This
is not a test of artistic ability, but try to copy the
drawings as accurately as you possibly can. Work
as fast or as slowly as you wish.
8

9. Continued
• No comments or additional instructions are to be
given while clients are completing the drawings.
• If clients ask specific questions, they should be
given a noncommittal answer
9

10. Scoring system
• Lacks (1984) adapted this system and provided a
detailed scoring manual along with substantial
empirical support.
• A system for children was developed by Koppitz
(1963, 1975).
10

11. Types of errors
1. Rotation
2. Overlapping difficulty
3. Simplification
4. Fragmentation
5. Retrogression
6. Perseveration
11

12. Continued..
7. Collision or collision tendency
8. Impotence
9. Closure difficulty
10. Motor in coordination
11. Angulations difficulty
12. Cohesion
12

13. • Scoring checklist for the Lacks indicators of organicity
• 1. Rotation
• ____________
• 2. Overlapping difficulty
• ____________
• 3. Simplification
• ____________
• 4. Fragmentation
• ____________
• 5. Retrogression
• ____________
• 6. Perseveration
• ____________
• 7. Collision or collision tendency
• ____________
• 8. Impotence
• ____________
• 9. Closure difficulty
• ____________
• 10. Motor in coordination
• ____________
• 11. Angulations difficulty
• ____________
• 12. Cohesion
• ____________
• Time greater than 15 minutes
• ____________
• Total score
• _____________
• Test diagnosis
• _____________
• Source: Adapted from Bender Gestalt Screening for Brain Dysfunction, 2nd ed., 1999, by Lacks, New York: Wiley.
13

14. Cutoff score
• 5 or more than 5 errors considered as have some
kind of neurological impairments or deficits.
14

15. Importance
• It is brief
• Economical
• Flexible
• Nonthreatening
• Nonverbal
• Extensively researched
• Ranked as the 25th most frequently used test
15

16. Criticism
• It does not provide in-depth information about the
specific details and varieties of such damage. In fact,
the Bender Gestalt is limited to relatively severe forms
of brain damage, especially in the right parietal region
of the right hemisphere (Black & Bernard, 1984).
• One difficulty in interpreting Bender Gestalt
performance is that a certain degree of overlap often
exists between emotional and organic indicators on the
Bender Gestalt.
• absence of a commonly accepted and verified scoring
and interpretation system
16