[3] The specific name, kintorei, is in honour of Algernon Keith-Falconer, 9th Earl of Kintore, a British politician who was a colonial governor of South Australia.

[5] Aboriginal Australian names for the skink include tjakura, mulyamiji, tjalapa, warrana (also spelt warrarna[3]), and nampu.

[6] It has smooth, small, glossy scales and is mostly rust-coloured on the top of the body, with the belly a vanilla colour.

Individuals of the great desert skink work in cooperation with one another to build and take care of their burrows, even digging out specific rooms for use as a defecatorium.

The study, carried out in the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park, also revealed that all immature lizards were full siblings in 18 of 24 burrow systems.

[3] Tjakura is omnivorous and can be considered an opportunist generalist as it consumes a diverse range of invertebrates and plants supplemented at least occasionally with small vertebrate prey items.