William J Ernst

• Doctor of Psychology
• Professor (Associate) at William Paterson University

Schools request consultation from neuropsychologists employed outside the school setting to enhance assessment and intervention for children with neurological, medical, and psychological conditions. The legislative and administrative parameters governing special education services for exceptional children most pertinent to the consulting neuropsych...

To identify potential misconceptions that nursing students have regarding traumatic brain injury (TBI) and recovery. Descriptive questionnaire. University. Thirty-item questionnaire addressing knowledge about TBI and recovery. One hundred eight undergraduate students, 65 in the prenursing program and 43 nursing majors. In general, nursing students...

Objective: The current study was designed to understand the culture of concussion among college student-athletes. Participants: Eight men's lacrosse and seven women's soccer players. Methods: A focus group was conducted to understand thoughts, barriers, team culture, and what was needed to feel safe reporting symptoms. Thematic analysis was conduc...

Objective To quantify the influence of barriers that prevent intention to report concussions in female athletes. Hypothesis: NCAA Division 1 (D1) athletes will have higher overall reporting barrier scores than Division 3 (D3). Method Participants/Setting: 70 participants started the study and 13 were removed due to incomplete questionnaires, resul...

Objective To understand concussion knowledge and attitudes toward safety among NCAA coaches. Design Cross-sectional. Setting Online survey. Participants 227 coaches at NCAA Division I, II, III colleges and universities. Outcome Measures A mixed-methods survey of Concussion Knowledge (CK), Concussion Attitude Index (CAI), coaches’ perceptions of...

Objective To describe thoughts that impede concussion reporting and those that might facilitate reporting in student-athletes that completed a concussion reporting worksheet as part of a peer concussion education program (PCEP). Design Document review with qualitative data analysis. Setting During a randomized controlled trial, 30 teams with rela...

Objective To determine collegiate student-athletes’ experiences with concussions, whom they were talking with, and patterns of concussion recognition. Design Randomized trial. Setting National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) teams. Participants 815 collegiate student-athlete controls in collision and contact sports from an intervention st...

Objective To describe the experiences of peer concussion educators (PCE’s) who implemented a peer concussion education program (PCEP) with collegiate athletes. Design Online debriefing questionnaire. Setting During a randomized controlled trial, 30 teams with relatively high concussion rates from 10 colleges across all 3 NCAA divisions received t...

Objective To determine Southern African parents’ concussion knowledge and intention to report in youth athletes. Method A diverse sample of 48 Southern African parents of youth athletes ages 5–18 completed an online survey. Recruitment included: 1) contacting school administrations to forward the survey to parents and 2) a social media post. The C...

Objective: To determine if a peer-led concussion reporting worksheet activity could elucidate barriers to reporting in collegiate athletes. Participants: Five hundred and three athletes from 7 universities across all three NCAA divisions. Methods: A supplementary qualitative analysis of responses to a concussion reporting worksheet completed during...

Primary objective: To examine the convergent validity of the Test of Effort (TOE), a performance validity test (PVT) currently under development that employs a two-subtest (one verbal, one visual), forced-choice recognition memory format. Research design: A descriptive, correlational design was employed to describe performance on the TOE and exa...

Background: Sports related concussions continue to be a public health concern and improving reporting behavior a focus of educational programs. While educational programs have addressed changes in knowledge of concussion symptoms, it has been challenging to design educational programs which have lasting effects on reporting behavior. Aims: The c...

Context: Concussion education and prevention programs require reliable and valid instruments to evaluate the theory, mechanisms, and outcome of these interventions Objective: To assess the psychometric properties of measures evaluating concussion education and prevention programsDesign: Descriptive epidemiological Setting: 10 NCAA-member universiti...

Context: Athletic trainers (AT) are often the first qualified healthcare provider to assess a sports-related concussion (SRC). However, recent literature shows that ATs can face several barriers when managing SRC, including pressure or skepticism from coaches. For example, recent studies suggest that coaches believe return-to-play protocols are too...

Background More than 460,000 female and male student-athletes compete in college sports each year, with 5.5 concussions reported per 1,000 athlete exposures. The majority of these concussions occurred during competition and are somewhat more likely to be reported by female athletes. Aims To evaluate moderating effects of gender differences in resp...

Context The National Collegiate Athletic Association and U.S. Department of Defense have called for educational programs to change the culture of concussion reporting, increase reporting behavior, and enhance the safety of players. Objective To evaluate the effects of a novel peer concussion-education program (PCEP) in changing knowledge, attitude...

Context A novel peer concussion-education program (PCEP) was developed to enhance concussion knowledge and reporting among collegiate student-athletes. Objective To describe the PCEP and its development and implementation. Design Program development consisting of a literature review, focus group, and pilot implementation. Setting Athletics depar...

Objective To evaluate the effectiveness of a novel peer concussion education program designed to increase knowledge of concussions, reporting of concussive events, and attitudes for both teammates and individuals in high concussive sports. Background Over 460,000 student-athletes compete in 24 NCAA sports every year. Concussions are estimated to o...

Objectives This study sought to describe reliable digit span (RDS) performance in a sample of children referred for evaluation due to academic difficulties and provide preliminary information regarding its utility as a performance validity test (PVT) in this population. Methods The sample included 110 children (M = 11.91, SD = 3.34, Range = 6-16)...

Objective This pilot study investigated the effect of a novel peer concussion education program on concussion knowledge in a sample of collegiate student-athletes. Method A pre-posttest design was employed to determine the effect of the program on concussion knowledge in a sample of 50 student-athletes (34 Men’s Lacrosse and 16 Women’s Soccer) par...

Purpose To determine if a novel peer concussion education program (PCEP) increased concussion knowledge and intention-to-report in collegiate football players. Methods A sample of football players (N=666) from 10 NCAA colleges were assessed at three time points (baseline, post-test, 1-month follow-up) with adapted measures of the concussion knowle...

The purpose of this study is to determine knowledge of traumatic brain injury among educators. Few studies have examined knowledge of traumatic brain injury in this population and fewer still have included a substantial proportion of general education teachers. Examining knowledge of traumatic brain injury in educators is important as the vast majo...

Objective: The purpose of this study was to describe performance on an indicator of effort, Reliable Digit Span (RDS), in a sample of children referred primarily due to academic difficulties. Little research has examined RDS performance in this population. Method: This archival study consisted of 37 children (28 males, 9 females) referred for a psy...