Computerized assessments and interactive simulation tasks are increasingly popular and afford the collection of process data, i.e., an examinee's sequence of actions (e.g., clickstreams, keystrokes) that arises from interactions with each task. Action sequence data contain rich information on the problem-solving process but are in a nonstandard,…

The influx of data and the advances in computing have led to calls to update the introductory statistics curriculum to better meet the needs of the contemporary workforce. To this end, we developed the COMputational Practices in Undergraduate TEaching of Statistics (COMPUTES) instrument, which can be used to measure the extent to which computation…

Remote association requires players to use their mental transformation to identify objects' relationships by activating knowledge application. A Chinese Remote Association game was designed (example question: [characters omitted], where the answer is [character omitted]) to explore learners' cognitive and affective effects, and then eighth grade…

This article used several data sets from a large-scale state testing program to examine the feasibility of combining general and modified assessment items in computerized adaptive testing (CAT) for different groups of students. Results suggested that several of the assumptions made when employing this type of mixed-item CAT may not be met for…

Simulation games are becoming increasingly popular in education, but more insight in their critical design features is needed. This study investigated the effects of fidelity of open patient cases in adjunct to an instructional e-module on students' cognitive skills and motivation. We set up a three-group randomized post-test-only design: a…

Common items with inconsistent b-parameter estimates may have a serious impact on item response theory (IRT)--based equating results. To find a better way to deal with the outlier common items with inconsistent b-parameters, the current study investigated the comparability of 10 variations of four IRT-based equating methods (i.e., concurrent…

Comparisons are made between BILOG version 2.2 and LOGIST 5.0 version 2.5 in estimating the item parameters, traits, item characteristic functions, and test characteristic functions for the three-parameter logistic model. Speed and accuracy are reported for a number of 10, 20, and 40-item tests. (Author/GDC)

Concern has been expressed over the item response theory (IRT) assumption that a person's ability can be estimated in a unidimensional latent space. To examine whether or not the response to an item requires only a single latent ability, unidimensional ability estimates were compared for data generated from the multidimensional item response…

This paper develops and applies three nonparametric comparisons of the shapes of two item characteristic surfaces: (1) proportional latent odds; (2) uniform relative difficulty; and (3) item sensitivity. A method is presented for comparing the relative shapes of two item characteristic curves in two examinee populations who were administered an…

Two order theoretic techniques were presented and compared. Ordering theory of Krus and Bart (1974) and an extended Takeya's item relational structure analysis (IRS) by Tatsuoka and Tatsuoka (1981) were used to extract the hierarchical item structure from three datasets. Directed graphs were constructed and both methods were assessed as to how…

This study investigated the distributional properties of the standardized residual that is commonly used in the Rasch model calibration program to develop various indices of item and person fit. The power of the standardized residual to detect measurement disturbances is also addressed. (TJH)

The effects of variations in degree of range restriction and different subgroup sample sizes on the validity of several item bias detection procedures based on Item Response Theory (IRT) were investigated in a simulation study. The degree of range restriction for each of two subpopulations was varied by cutting the specified subpopulation ability…

This study examined three statistical methods for selecting items for mastery tests: (1) pretest-posttest; (2) latent trait; and (3) agreement statistics. The correlation between the latent trait method and agreement statistics, proposed here as an alternative, was substantial. Results for the pretest-posttest method confirmed its reputed…

The use of new extension of standard Item Response Theory (IRT) modeling of dichotomous items to include external variables is proposed. External variables may appear both as categorical grouping variables and as continuous variables; this requires the formulation of a model for the relationships between the external variables and the response…

In order to evaluate our methods and approaches of estimating the operating characteristics of discrete item responses, it is necessary to try other comparable methods on similar sets of data. LOGIST 5 was taken up for this reason, and was tried upon the hypothetical test items, which follow the normal ogive model and were used frequently in…