Ultimately, measures in research, testing, assessment and evaluation are used, or have implications, for ranking, intervention, feedback, decision-making or policy purposes. Explicit recognition of this fact brings the often-ignored and sometimes maligned concept of consequences to the fore. Given that measures have personal and social…

In this article, Hartley notes the difficulties of using questionnaires to assess the efficiency of new instructional methods and highlights nine issues that researchers must consider. Hartley continues the discussion about the use of questionnaires and suggests that psychology teachers can help improve the teaching of psychology by drawing…

A response is made to a paper that urges the use of the Rasch model for educational assessment. This paper argues that the model is inadequate and that claims for its efficacy are exaggerated and technically weak.

This commentary on the article titled "Examining the Internal Structure Evidence for the Performance Assessment for California Teachers: A Validation Study of the Elementary Literacy Teaching Event for Tier 1 Teacher Licensure" provides an overview of Performance Assessment for California Teachers (PACT), its relationship to edTPA and…

Assessments used for both clinical practice and research should show evidence of validity and reliability for the target group of people. It is easy to agree with this statement, but it is not always easy to choose the right assessment for the right purpose. Recently there have been increasing numbers of studies which investigate further the…

Recommendations are made for the appropriate use and identification of traditional Kuder-Richardson formulas for the estimation of reliability. "Alpha" should be used for reliabilities estimated for tests or scales composed of items yielding scores distributed on more than two points. (SLD)

The concern behind my question, "Can there be validity without reliability?" (Moss, 1994), was about the influence of measurement practices on the quality of education. I argued that conventional operationalizations of reliability in the measurement literature, which I summarized as "consistency, quantitatively defined, among independent…

Points out the difficulty in judging a student's writing ability on the basis of one piece of writing. Suggests alternative evaluation procedures. (EL)

This paper provides a list of 10 salient features of the standard error of measurement, contrasting it to the reliability coefficient. It is concluded that the standard error of measurement should be regarded as a primary characteristic of a mental test. (Author/DWH)

When using assessment instruments for personnel purposes, identify the purposes of assessment, specify criteria for excellent performance, determine behavior standards, and select appropriate methodology. Correlation analysis is a useful technique for establishing the validity of an instrument. (SK)

The author traces reasons to support his contention that the state of the art in assessing learning disabled students is not good. Among issues examined are the following: use of tests for purposes other than those for which they were intended; technical adequacy of currently used tests (standardization, reliability, validity); the use of deficit…

The reliability and validity of chance-level scores should be investigated. Only a careful examination of such scores can suggest whether they are likely to reflect random responding or to represent a reasonable estimate of an examinee's ability. (Author/RL)

Recognizes the attraction of Goal Attainment Scaling (GAS), a technique that uses a scale to measure client's achievement, but suggests that there are concerns about the calculation of its standard scores. Examples show how GAS may be used in service development, whether or not numerical values are attached. (Author/CR)

Discusses the problems of readers' different responses to essay test passages and the implications for the subsequent writing assignment. Describes a model of the writing assessment episode and discusses four generalizations about writing task interpretation. (HTH)

The article focuses on the controversy over norm-referenced v criterion-referenced measures (CRM) in assessment of learning disorders. The authors contend that while the reliability of CRMs is generally indisputable, the validity of measures designed from local curricula is still dependent on the intuitive judgments of teachers. (Author/SBH)