The susceptibility to faking on the Tennessee Self Concept Scale was examined among college students. Additionally, groups of respondents, instructed to respond in a "random" fashion to pre-determined numbers of items in the TSCS, were subjected to a plausibility analysis of their test response vectors using the Rasch measurement model.…

The wording and structure of questionnaire items can interact with specified sample categories based on evaluation goals and respondent characteristics. The effects of the interactions can restructure samples and introduce bias into the data analysis. These effects, and suggestions for avoiding them, are demonstrated for five types of…

This research investigated the effect on estimated lower asymptotes of the instructions to Graduate Record Examination (GRE) examinees about how the test would be scored. This effect was assessed for four different verbal item types (analogies, antonyms, sentence completion, and reading comprehension) using a two-way, unweighted means analysis of…

Analyses of student responses to Introductory Psychology test questions were discussed. The publisher supplied a two thousand item test bank on computer tape. Instructors selected questions for fifteen item tests. The test questions were labeled by the publisher as factual or conceptual. The semester course used a mastery learning format in which…

Five statistical indices are developed and described which may be used for determining (1) when linear equating of two approximately parallel tests is adequate, and (2) whan a more complex method such as equipercentile equating must be used. The indices were based on: (1) similarity of cumulative score distributions; (2) shape of the raw-score to…

A multiple true-false item is one where a testee has to identify statements as true or false within a cluster (of two or more) of such statements. Clusters are then scored as items. This study showed such a procedure to yield less reliable results than traditional true-false items. (JKS)

In discriminant analyses of student performance on medical science certifying examinations developed by the faculties at a parent campus and regional campus, curriculum bias in examination items was shown to exist. Test construction procedures and exchange and review by faculties were found inadequate to prevent curriculum dependence. (Author/CM)

Multidimensional scaling (MDS) and components solutions were compared using two balanced self-report item sets. Results suggest that when self-report items are balanced and negatively worded items are not reverse scored, MDS and components solutions can differ largely, due to a component associated with measures of acquiescence. (SLD)

This study was designed to increase knowledge of the functioning of item bias techniques in detecting biased items. Previous studies have used computer-generated data or real data with unknown amounts of bias. The present project extends previous studies by using items that are logically generated and subjectively evaluated a priori to be biased…

Undergraduates responded to an objective test in electronics and classified each item by domain (one of 14 topics covered in their text), and by type of knowledge (definition, fact, principle, or interpretation). These judgments were compared to their instructor's "standard" judgments. From these data, an index of item-domain divergence…

The purpose of this study was to determine whether item difficulty is significantly affected by language difficulty and response set convergence. Language difficulty was varied by increasing sentence (stem) length, increasing syntactic complexity, and substituting uncommon words for more familiar terms in the item stem. Item wording ranged from…

This study was designed to gather data on the meaning of imprecise terms from items written by physicians for their students and by test committees for national licensure and certification examinations. A total of 32 members of test committees who write examination items for various medical specialty examinations participated in the study. Each…

The purpose of this study was to determine if correlations among student ratings items designed to be diagnostic could be lowered through use of special instructions to raters. The authors argue that the lowering of inter-item correlations is indicative of a reduction of the halo effect which leads to greater item diagnosticity. The experimental…

A study compared college students' performance on complex multiple-choice tests with scores on multiple true-false clusters. Researchers concluded that the multiple-choice tests did not accurately measure students' knowledge and that cueing and guessing led to grade inflation. (PP)

A model is presented using examinee judgements in detecting ambiguous/misinterpreted items on teacher-made criterion-referenced tests. A computational example and guidelines for constructing domain categories and interpreting the indices are presented. (Author/PN)