ConductCognition

Processing Speed

Trail Making Test A

Capture visual scanning and sequencing speed with a remote-friendly browser version of TMT-A.

Useful for processing-speed baselines, visual-search research, and neuropsychological screening workflows.

Processing Speed2-3 minHosted browser workflow
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Connect numbers in order

What this task measures

Measures processing speed and visual scanning by asking participants to connect numbered circles in ascending order as quickly as possible.

Core constructs

  • Visual scanning
  • Processing speed
  • Number sequencing
  • Psychomotor coordination

Research fit

  • Neuropsychological screening
  • Traumatic brain injury assessment
  • Dementia screening (part of standard battery)
  • Psychomotor speed evaluation
  • Pre-surgical cognitive baseline

Why researchers use ConductCognition

  • Hosted browser delivery with no local install burden for participants.
  • Study setup, scoring, exports, and participant links in one workflow.
  • Transparent pricing instead of opaque enterprise quoting for solo labs.
  • Free entry tier plus Academic Pro when you need the full battery and raw exports.

Paradigm overview

Trail Making Test Part A measures visual scanning and processing speed. Participants must connect 25 numbered circles in ascending order (1-2-3-...25) as quickly as possible by clicking each circle in sequence. The circles are randomly positioned on a canvas.

The task was originally developed for the Army Individual Test Battery (1944) and later incorporated into the Halstead-Reitan Neuropsychological Battery. Part A primarily measures psychomotor speed and visual search efficiency with minimal cognitive demand beyond number sequencing.

Completion time is the primary outcome. Errors are tracked but in the computerized version, incorrect clicks are simply rejected (the circle doesn't connect), so errors primarily reflect misclicks rather than sequencing failures. TMT-A serves as the motor-speed baseline against which TMT-B performance is compared to isolate executive function.

Key scoring outputs

Completion Time

ms

Total time from first click to connecting the final circle. Primary speed measure.

Lower is better

Completion Time (sec)

seconds

Same as completion time, converted to seconds with one decimal place.

Lower is better

Errors

count

Number of incorrect clicks (wrong circle selected).

Lower is better

Total Circles

count

Number of circles in the trail (25 for TMT-A).

Informational

Normative and citation context

Tombaugh TN (2004). Trail Making Test A and B: Normative data stratified by age and education. Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology, 19(2):203-214.

N 91118-89

Paper-based norms. Computerized versions typically yield 10-20% faster completion times.

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Related task pages

Trail Making Test BSimple Reaction Time