Under the leadership of principal investigator Richard C. Gershon, a team of more than 300 scientists from nearly 100 academic institutions were charged with developing a set of tools to enhance data collection in large cohort studies and to advance the neurobehavioral research enterprise.
With the NIH Toolbox, researchers can assess function using a common metric and can “crosswalk” among measures, supporting the pooling and sharing of large data sets.
The NIH Toolbox will support scientific discovery by bringing a common language to research questions – both with respect to the primary study aims and to those arising from secondary data analyses.
Initial literature and database reviews and a Request for Information of NIH-funded researchers identified the sub-domains for inclusion in the NIH Toolbox, existing measures relevant to the project goals, and criteria for instrument selection.
NIH Project Team members, external content experts, and contract scientists met at a follow-up consensus meeting to discuss potential sub-domains along with the criteria affecting instrument selection, creation, and norming.
A second consensus group meeting was held and results directed the selection of the sub-domains within each core domain area to be measured in the final NIH Toolbox.
[7][8] For tests using item response theory approaches to scoring, calibration samples generally included several thousand participants, ensuring robust models.
A sample of 4,859 participants, ages 3–85 – representative of the U.S. population based on gender, race/ethnicity, and socioeconomic status – was administered all of the NIH Toolbox measures at sites around the country.
[10] NIH Toolbox measure development focused special attention on assessing young children,[13] to ensure that all tests given are developmentally appropriate for ages 3–7.