For the past three millennia, there have been attempts to determine the link between damage to specific areas of the brain and behavioural differences. However, the first systematic neuropsychological assessment and a battery of the behavioural tasks to investigate specific aspects of behavioural regulation was developed by Alexander Luria in 1942-1948. Luria was working with big samples of brain-injured Russian soldiers during and after the second World War. Among many insights from Luria's rehabilitation practice and observations, was the fundamental discovery of the involvement of frontal lobes of the cortex in plasticity, initiation, planning and organization of behaviour. His Go/no-go task, which was one of the tasks screening for the frontal lobe damage, "count by 7", hands-clutching, clock-drawing task, drawing of repeatitive patterns, word associations and categories recall and others became standard components of neuropsychological assessment and mental status screening. Considering the originality and multiplicity of neuropsychological components offered by Alexander Luria, he is recognized as a father of neuropsychological assessment.
Alexander Luria's neuropsychological battery was adapted in the United States in the form of Luria-Nebraska neuropsychological battery in 1970s. Then the tasks used in this battery were borrowed in more modern neuropsychological batteries and in the Mini–mental state examination test for screening of demenia.
