This chapter presents an overview of the mental status examination, its core elements, and its most commonly used methods. The mental status examination focuses on cognitive, emotional, behavioral, and related sensorimotor functions and their disturbances - i.e., neuropsychiatric symptoms, signs, and syndromes. Through observation, interview, and testing, the mental status examination identifies the symptoms and signs of structural and/or functional disturbances of the brain. Neuropsychiatric symptoms and signs are sometimes categorized as positive or negative. Atypical clinical presentations sometimes are neurological condition-specific variants of typical neuropsychiatric syndromes. The observational components of the mental status examination are undertaken at the first moment of any form of contact with a patient and continue throughout the entire clinical encounter. Observation continues throughout the clinical interview, during which the examiner attends to the patient's appearance, behavior, statements, manner of communicating, and interpersonal interactions with examiner.