The difficulty of test items administered by paper and pencil were compared with the difficulty of the same items administered by computer. The study was conducted to determine if an interaction exists between mode of test administration and ability. An arithmetic reasoning test was constructed for this study. All examinees had taken the Armed…

In defense of retaining the "latent trait theory" term, instead of replacing it with "item response theory" as some recent research would have it, the following objectives are outlined: (1) investigation of theory and method for estimating the operating characteristics of discrete item responses using a minimum number of…

The testlet, a bundle of test items, alleviates some problems associated with computerized adaptive testing: context effects, lack of robustness, and item difficulty ordering. While testlets may be linear or hierarchical, the most useful ones are four-level hierarchical units, containing 15 items and partitioning examinees into 16 classes. (GDC)

An experiment was conducted that contrasted a variant of computerized adaptive testing, self-adapted testing, with two traditional tests. Participants completed a self-report of text anxiety and were randomly assigned to take one of the three tests of verbal ability. Subjects generally chose more difficult items as the test progressed. (Author/LMO)

This study examines the effect of item response time across 30 items on ability estimates in a high stakes computer adaptive graduate admissions examination. Examinees were categorized according to 4 item response time patterns, and the categories are compared in terms of ability estimates. Significant differences between response time patterns…

Information provided for computerized adaptive test (CAT) simulees was compared under two conditions on two moderately correlated trait composites, mathematics and reading comprehension. The first condition used information provided by in-scale items alone, while the second condition used information provided by in- and out-of-scale items together…

A computerized adaptive test (CAT) administration usually requires a large supply of items with accurately estimated psychometric properties, such as item response theory (IRT) parameter estimates, to ensure the precision of examinee ability estimation. However, an estimated IRT model of a given item in any given pool does not always correctly…

This paper proposes a new Information-Time index as the basis for item selection in computerized classification testing (CCT) and investigates how this new item selection algorithm can help improve test efficiency for item pools with mixed item types. It also investigates how practical constraints such as item exposure rate control, test…

This paper focuses on a version of sequential mastery testing (i.e., classifying students as a master/nonmaster or continuing testing and administering another item or testlet) in which response behavior is modeled by a multidimensional item response theory (IRT) model. First, a general theoretical framework is outlined that is based on a…

Chapters in this book present the challenges and dilemmas faced by researchers as they created new computerized assessments, focusing on issues addressed in developing, scoring, and administering the assessments. Chapters are: (1) "Beyond Bells and Whistles; An Introduction to Computerized Assessment" (Julie B. Olson-Buchanan and Fritz Drasgow);…

Describes computer program designed to diagnose student arithmetic achievement in following categories: number concepts, addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. Capabilities of the program are discussed, including immediate diagnosis, tailored testing, test security (unique tests generated), generative responses (nonmultiple choice),…

Compared three online pretest calibration scaling methods through simulation: (1) marginal maximum likelihood with one expectation maximization (EM) cycle (OEM) method; (2) marginal maximum likelihood with multiple EM cycles (MEM); and (3) M. Stocking's method B. MEM produced the smallest average total error in parameter estimation; OEM yielded…

Some alternative criteria for item selection in adaptive testing are proposed that take into account uncertainty in the ability estimates. A simulation study shows that the likelihood weighted information criterion is a good alternative to the maximum information criterion. Another good alternative uses a Bayesian expected a posteriori estimator.…

An item selection procedure for computerized adaptive testing based on average global information is proposed. Results from simulation studies comparing the approach with the usual maximum item information item selection indicate that the new method leads to improvement in terms of bias and mean squared error reduction under many circumstances.…

Analyzed examinee responses to conventional (multiple-choice) and innovative item formats in a computer-based testing program for item response theory (IRT) information with the three parameter and graded response models. Results for more than 3,000 adult examines for 2 tests show that the innovative item types in this study provided more…