Inability of the Rarely Missed Index to identify simulated malingering under more realistic assessment conditions

The Wechsler Memory Scale-III (WMS-III) Rarely Missed Index (RMI) was developed by Killgore and DellaPietra (1999b, 2000b, 2001) to detect malingering. Its development was based on item-response biases in the Logical Memory Delayed Recognition (LMDR) items of the WMS-III (Killgore DellaPietra, 1999a, 2000a). We completed replication studies using undergraduates, analog malingerers, and patients. In Experiment 1, 100 undergraduates nave to the WMS-III Logical Memory stories were administered the LMDR, and item-response biases were explored. In Experiment 2, 49 undergraduates feigned brain injury on cognitive and symptom validity tests. Data were also extracted from 83 traumatic brain injury (TBI), dementia, psychiatric/pain, stroke, and other patient files. Neither the previously reported item-response biases nor the diagnostic utility of the RMI in identifying simulated malingerers were replicated.