Argues that student assessment plays a crucial role in the academic life of college students, and assessment arrangements embody the purposes of higher education. Reviews research suggesting learners' perceptions of course testing procedures is the single most important influence on learning. Outlines six guiding principles of test development to…

The Defining Issues Test (DIT) of moral judgment, a stage preference approach, is compared with the Moral Judgment Test (MJT) widely used in Europe. The MJT is a stage consistency test. Construct validity is defined in terms of seven types of studies, which support use of the stage preference approach. (SLD)

Studied evaluation practices and the attitudes of teachers in the Netherlands toward these practices through a survey of 617 teachers and 214 principals. Findings show assessment routines to be strongly domain-dependent. Teachers have a preference for curriculum-embedded tests and the grading of work sheets above norm-referenced tests. Overall,…

This case study was designed to demonstrate how an institution could use readily available archival data to produce a simple yet informative validity study as a necessary step in understanding the effectiveness of their selection process. Results indicated the GRE does not significantly predict graduate school success across all disciplines…

Responds to five major articles by Duckworth, Goldman, Healy, Sampson, and Goodyear on issues pertaining to testing and assessment in counseling psychology. Suggests that the interactive, collaborative aspects of the assessment relationship between psychologist and client need more attention. (TE)

Tested criterion-related validity of Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Revised (WISC-R) performance scale with Stanford Achievement Test, Special Edition for Hearing-Impaired Students (SAT-HI). Results indicated WISC-R performance scale has adequate criterion-related validity and SAT-HI percentile ranks may provide a better metric than…

Reviews recent developments in the use of commercially available written integrity tests for employee selection. Discusses legal issues related to the use of the polygraph and integrity tests, and reviews empirical research on the reliability, criterion-related validity, construct validity, fakeability, and adverse effects of integrity tests. (TE)

Conducted study to examine effectiveness of Career Area Interest Checklist (CAIC) with junior high school students. Findings from 35 eighth graders revealed that the 4 most preferred and 4 least preferred career areas had the highest rate of agreement. Findings provide some initial support for using CAIC with junior high school students. (NB)

Examines the utility of the Early Childhood Environmental Rating Scale (ECERS) as a measure of child day care quality at eight child care centers in New Zealand. Notes discrepancies between findings of this study and of other studies in quality levels and items predictive of centers' total ECERS score. (RJC)

Describes the Child Abuse Potential Inventory and associated psychometric data. Discusses uses and misuses of the inventory, general test limitations, and screening instruments available to professionals concerned with child maltreatment. (RJC)

This paper demonstrates how an analysis of the "Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing" (1985) can define the body of knowledge needed by teachers for the effective use of tests in classroom instruction. Procedures are described for identifying standards relevant to teachers' roles and their behavior. (SLD)

This commentary discusses three essential themes in performance assessment and its scoring. First, scores should mean something. Second, performance scores should permit fair and meaningful comparisons. Third, validity-reducing errors should be minimal. Increased attention to performance assessment may overcome these problems. (SLD)

This book discusses adapting pencil-and-paper tests to computerized testing. Mention is made of models for graded responses to items and of possibilities beyond pencil-and-paper-tests, but the book is essentially about dichotomously scored test items. Contrasts between item response theory and classical test theory are described. (SLD)

The Response to Conflict Scale, a 24-item measure of maladaptive responses to marital conflict, was evaluated psychometrically with 420 couples. The inventory showed high internal consistency, test-retest reliability, construct and discriminant validity, and classification efficiency. Clinical utility is discussed. (SLD)

Methods of adjusting group differences in assessment and test scores are described, classified, and evaluated. Investigation of the relationship between intended use of test scores and the appropriate meaning of scores is essential for fair treatment in assessment. (SLD)