Intelligence tests are used in a variety of settings such as schools, clinics, and courts to assess the intellectual capacity of individuals of all ages. Intelligence tests are used to make high-stakes decisions such as special education placement, employment, eligibility for social security services, and determination of the death penalty.…

Administration and scoring of cognitive assessments have evolved from a paper-based platform to a digital format. Since this advancement, Pearson has created a system (Q-interactive) that allows examiners to administer the WISC-V via two iPads. However, limited research exists exploring the effects of this new method of administration when…

The Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC) is the most widely used intelligence test in the world. Now in its fifth edition, the WISC-V has been translated and adapted for use in nearly a dozen countries. Despite its popularity, numerous concerns have been raised about some of the procedures used to develop and validate translated and…

This article is a commentary on McGill et al.'s (2020) article "Use of Translated and Adapted Versions of the WISC-V: Caveat Emptor." McGill et al. use caveat emptor in their title to indicate that the buyer of an assessment must be careful about the product being purchased, presumably because the seller of the assessment is not being…

The purpose of this study was to use multidimensional scaling (MDS) to investigate relations among scores from the standardization sample of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children--Fifth edition (WISC-V; Wechsler, 2014). Nonmetric two-dimensional MDS maps were selected for interpretation. The most cognitively complex subtests and indexes…

As a result of the upcoming Federal reauthorization of the Individuals With Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA), practitioners and researchers have begun vigorously debating what constitutes evidence-based assessment for the identification of specific learning disability (SLD). This debate has resulted in strong support for a method that…

Different experimental techniques for empirical assessment of children's linguistic ability have produced conflicting evidence. A number of such contradictions are discussed, in the context of an analysis of the potential weaknesses, and consequent requirements, of both comprehension and production tasks. (A commentary by P. L. Harris appears on…

This paper presents a framework for conceptualizing the different ways in which instructions in experimental tasks may be misunderstood. Five possible types of misunderstandings are identified and discussed: (1) misunderstanding of a particular term in the instructions; (2) misinterpretation of a task because the instructions are difficult to…

Parents are often asked to complete behavioral checklists and personality inventories regarding their children when they bring them in for psychotherapy or neuropsychological testing. The Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL), the Conners' Parent Report Scale (CPRS), and the Personality Inventory for Children (PIC) are frequently used tests. Some…

Parents and professionals working with children with disabilities are urged to be alert to discrepancies between a child's usual behavior and capabilities and those exhibited during a formal testing or evaluation session. (DB)

An evaluation of Round One of a pilot study of a system for identifying effective youth organizations around the world is presented in this report. The report begins with a page of general observations about the successes and shortcomings of the pilot study, indicating that in general the study accomplished its objectives but that a need for…

Examined the validity coefficients of all possible WISC-R short forms of several subtests. Comparisons were made between coefficients given by McNemar's and Silverstein's formulas to determine "best" short forms for different uses. Results indicated only a slight difference between short forms selected by the two methods. (Author)

Issues surrounding accurate assessment of depression in children have received much attention. However, the stability of scores from depression measures has generally been estimated using only classical test score theory, rather than the more powerful generalizability theory. The dependability of scores from the Children's Depression Inventory…

This report summarizes some of the literature focusing on specific aspects of the cultures of American Indians and the concommitant testing and assessment problems. The issues of non-competitiveness, language barriers, and a high incidence of middle ear disease among American Indian children are examined as they affect the assessment process. The…

This article describes practices effective in assessing communication and language in persons with autism. It reviews basic principles that govern assessment in the discipline of speech-language pathology, discusses features associated with autism that affect communication and language assessment, and provides strategies to address these features.…