Classical item analysis (CIA) entails summarizing items based on two key attributes: item difficulty and item discrimination, defined as the proportion of examinees answering correctly and the difference in correctness between high and low scorers. Recent insights reveal a direct link between these measures and aspects of signal detection theory…

This article builds upon a proiminent definition of construct validity that focuses on variation in attributes causing variation in measurement outcomes. This article synthesizes the defintion and uses Rasch measurement modeling to explicate a modified conceptualization of construct validity for assessments of developmental attributes. If…

Cloze tests have been the subject of numerous studies regarding their function and use in both first language and second language contexts (e.g., Jonz & Oller, 1994; Watanabe & Koyama, 2008). From a validity standpoint, one area of investigation has been the extent to which cloze tests measure reading ability beyond the sentence level.…

Background: We compared responsiveness to two self-report assessments of loneliness: the "UCLA Loneliness Scale" (UCLALS) designed for the general community, and the "Modified Worker Loneliness Questionnaire" (MWLQ) designed for people with intellectual disability (ID). Methods: Participants were 56 older adults with…

Experts use their domain expertise and knowledge of examinees' ability levels as they write test items. The expert test writer can then estimate the difficulty of the test items subjectively. However, an objective method for assigning difficulty to a test item would capture the cognitive demands imposed on the examinee as well as be…

The Latin Square Task (LST) was developed by Birney, Halford, and Andrews [Birney, D. P., Halford, G. S., & Andrews, G. (2006). Measuring the influence of cognitive complexity on relational reasoning: The development of the Latin Square Task. Educational and Psychological Measurement, 66, 146-171.] and represents a non-domain specific,…

Successful exam composition can be a difficult task. Exams should not only assess student comprehension, but be learning tools in and of themselves. In a biotechnology course delivered to nonmajors at a business college, objective multiple-choice test questions often require students to choose the exception or "not true" choice. Anecdotal student…

Development of adaptive tests used in K-12 settings requires the creation of stable measurement scales to measure the growth of individual students from one grade to the next, and to measure change in groups from one year to the next. Accountability systems like No Child Left Behind require stable measurement scales so that accountability has…

The development of a new technique, the Relative Difficulty Ratio (RDR), is described, as well as how it can be used to determine the difficulty level of a test so that meaningful inter-test difficulty comparisons can be made. Assumptions made in computing RDR include: 1) each item must be scored dichotomously with only one answer choice keyed as…

In this technical report, we describe the development and piloting of a series of mathematics progress monitoring measures intended for use with students in grade 1. These measures, available as part of easyCBM [TM], an online progress monitoring assessment system, were developed in 2008 and administered to approximately 2800 students from schools…

The concept of scaled achievement tests is discussed and a method of selecting those items of a test that form the most scalable (i.e., having the highest coefficient of reproducibility) subset is presented. Sometimes called a monotonic-deterministic model, this type of test assumes that the test items may be sequentially ordered. To determine the…

A number of empirical studies are suggested to answer certain questions in connection with flexilevel tests. (MS)

Many combinations of a method and an approach for estimating the operating characteristics of the graded item responses, without assuming any mathematical forms, have been produced. In these methods, a set of items whose characteristics are known, or Old Test, is used, which has a large, constant amount of test information throughout the interval…

A flexilevel test is found to be inferior to a peaked conventional test for measuring examinees in the middle of the ability range, superior for examinees at the extremes. Throughout the entire range of ability, a flexilevel test is much superior to any conventional test that attempts to provide accurate measurement at both extremes. See also ED…