This dissertation presents a comprehensive review of the evolution of DIF analysis within educational measurement from the 1980s to the present. The review elucidates the concept of DIF, particularly emphasizing the crucial role of grouping for exhibiting DIF. Then, the dissertation introduces an innovative modification to the newly developed…

Item position effect (IPE) refers to situations where an item performs differently when it is administered in different positions on a test. The majority of previous research studies have focused on investigating IPE under linear testing. There is a lack of IPE research under adaptive testing. In addition, the existence of IPE might violate Item…

Popular item response theory (IRT) models are considered complex, mainly due to the inclusion of a random factor variable (latent variable). The random factor variable represents the incidental parameter problem since the number of parameters increases when including data of new persons. Therefore, IRT models require a specific estimation method…

This study conducted a comprehensive comparison of Item Response Theory (IRT) linking methods applied to a bifactor model, examining their performance on both multiple choice (MC) and mixed format tests within the common item nonequivalent group design framework. Four distinct multidimensional IRT linking approaches were explored, consisting of…

Researchers who use measurement models for evaluation purposes often select models with stringent requirements, such as Rasch models, which are parametric. Mokken Scale Analysis (MSA) offers a theory-driven nonparametric modeling approach that may be more appropriate for some measurement applications. Researchers have discussed using MSA as a…

Background/purpose: This study aimed to reveal the accuracy of estimation of multiple-choice test items parameters following the models of the item-response theory in measurement. Materials/methods: The researchers depended on the measurement accuracy indicators, which express the absolute difference between the estimated and actual values of the…

Low test-taking effort of examinees has been considered a source of construct-irrelevant variance in item response modeling, leading to serious consequences on parameter estimation. This study aims to investigate how non-effortful response (NER) influences the estimation of item and person parameters in item-pool scale linking (IPSL) and whether…

This study proposed Gibbs sampling algorithms for variable selection in a latent regression model under a unidimensional two-parameter logistic item response theory model. Three types of shrinkage priors were employed to obtain shrinkage estimates: double-exponential (i.e., Laplace), horseshoe, and horseshoe+ priors. These shrinkage priors were…

Researchers who work with ordinal rating scales sometimes encounter situations where the scale categories do not function in the intended or expected way. For example, participants' use of scale categories may result in an empirical difficulty ordering for the categories that does not match what was intended. Likewise, the level of distinction…

A Q-matrix is a binary matrix that defines the relationship between items and latent variables and is widely used in diagnostic classification models (DCMs), and can also be adopted in multidimensional item response theory (MIRT) models. The construction process of the Q-matrix is typically carried out by experts in the subject area of the items…

A Q-matrix is a binary matrix that defines the relationship between items and latent variables and is widely used in diagnostic classification models (DCMs), and can also be adopted in multidimensional item response theory (MIRT) models. The construction process of the Q-matrix is typically carried out by experts in the subject area of the items…

Human ratings are ubiquitous in creativity research. Yet, the process of rating responses to creativity tasks -- typically several hundred or thousands of responses, per rater -- is often time-consuming and expensive. Planned missing data designs, where raters only rate a subset of the total number of responses, have been recently proposed as one…

Identifying items with differential item functioning (DIF) in an assessment is a crucial step for achieving equitable measurement. One critical issue that has not been fully addressed with existing studies is how DIF items can be detected when data are multilevel. In the present study, we introduced a Lord's Wald X[superscript 2] test-based…

A standard assumption of latent class (LC) analysis is conditional independence, that is the items of the LC are independent of the covariates given the LCs. Several approaches have been proposed for identifying violations of this assumption. The recently proposed likelihood ratio approach is compared to residual statistics (bivariate residuals…

The focus of this paper is on the empirical relationship between item difficulty and item discrimination. Two studies--an empirical investigation and a simulation study--were conducted to examine the association between item difficulty and item discrimination under classical test theory and item response theory (IRT), and the effects of the…