The truth about 'Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV.'

We talked to the creator of a popular dementia test. He said Trump and media coverage keep distorting it.

A Craiyon drawing of Donald Trump taking a test.

Maybe we all need a cognitive test, because it certainly seems like there’s a mass déjà vu. Are we reliving 2020 — or even worse, are we sure the year actually ended?

As we get closer to another Joe Biden vs. Donald Trump election, the news cycles that animated their last campaigns are being reanimated today.

A recent example: Trump proclaiming that he “aced” a cognitive test when he was in the White House, as he again seeks to fend off criticism of his age and acuity. From his remarks in New Hampshire last Wednesday:

“I think it was 30, 35 questions…. They always show you the first one, like a giraffe, a tiger, or this, or that, and then: a whale. ‘Which one is the whale?’ Okay. And that goes on for three or four [questions], and then it gets harder, and harder, and harder.”

If Trump’s animal-naming skills feel familiar, it’s because we already lived through a similar moment four years ago, when Trump bragged about taking the test and repeating a five-word sequence — “Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV” — as a sign of his good mental health.

That infamous line quickly graced headlines, was emblazoned on t-shirts and become late-night TV fodder.

Physicians aren’t sure why Trump keeps bringing up the cognitive test, my colleague Ashley Parker and I wrote at The Washington Post — especially because it doesn’t really measure what he claims.

"It's not an IQ test. It's not a test of intelligence. It's a screening test really designed for patients who may have some symptoms of cognitive decline,” said Jonathan Reiner, a cardiologist and professor of medicine and surgery at George Washington University’s medical school.

Also notable: Trump keeps describing things that aren’t on the actual test, said Ziad Nasreddine, the Canadian neurologist who invented the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, or MoCA.¹

For instance, the grouping of animals that the former president announced last week? There’s no version of the MoCA that features that combination, Nasreddine said in an interview, adding that one of the animals floated by the president was a total surprise.

“I don’t think we have a version with a whale,” said Nasreddine, who allowed for the possibility that Trump was just offering hypothetical examples. (We didn’t get an answer from the Trump campaign before publishing.)

You can read our Washington Post piece here. No paywall!

Nasreddine also offered a dose of truth about ‘Person. Woman. Man. Camera. TV,’ years after Trump’s first claims about his MoCA test went viral.

Notably, that five-word sequence never would have been on the MoCA, Nasreddine said, describing how the actual words are selected over years of scientific study. The test would not include closely related words like “woman” and “man,” or “camera” and “TV,” he added.

“We tell you to learn five words that are random words, that are not actually linkable together,” Nasreddine said, explaining how different parts of the test are intended to measure different aspects of brain function. For instance, patients are asked to recall that short list of five random words after five minutes have passed. Other sections focus on basic math, language and executive function.

Concentration and calculation are particularly hard, Nasreddine noted, in ways that animal-naming are not. And if it feels simple, that’s the point: for healthy brains, it should be.

But for people struggling with early cognitive impairment, the MoCA presents multiple tripwires, helping physicians make a diagnosis.

“It's a serious test, and it’s scientifically validated,” Nasreddine added. “It sometimes pains me to see that it is ridiculed in the media.”

Again: You can read our Washington Post piece here.²

1. Ronny Jackson, who was a White House physician and is now a U.S. representative, administered the MoCA to then-President Trump in 2018.

2. A piece that has no ridicule of the test. (Just some subtle acknowledgement of our ridiculous political moment.)