As a result of the fact that judgments of non-native speech are closely tied to social biases, oral proficiency ratings are susceptible to error because of rater background and social attitudes. In the present study we seek first to estimate the variance attributable to rater background and attitudinal variables on novice raters' assessments of L2…

This study investigated the effect of the interaction between test takers' background knowledge and language proficiency on their performance on the "TOEFL iBT"® reading section. Test takers with the target content background knowledge (the focal groups) and those without (the reference groups) were identified for each of the 5 selected…

Contends that the Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL) has some very serious defects. First, it does not test either the ability to speak or to write English. Second, it has strong cultural biases. Third, a relatively large number of right answers can be obtained by guesswork. (SED)

A collection of articles on second-language testing includes: "The State of Language Testing in the 1990s" (J. Charles Alderson); "The Exercise of Power and Control in the Rhetorics of Testing" (Elana Shohamy); "Institutional and Political Aspects of Language Testing" (Bernard Spolsky); "Language Planning Policy…