Psychometrics has recently undergone extensive criticism within the medical education literature. The use of quantitative measurement using psychometric instruments such as response scales is thought to emphasize a narrow range of relevant learner skills and competencies. Recent reviews and commentaries suggest that a paradigm shift might be…

The literature on bibliometric indices for assessing scholarly impact, in particular the "h" index (Hirsch, 2005) and its many variants, is extensive, but nevertheless Ruscio and colleagues (this issue) succeed in making a valuable contribution. They have made the effort of collecting publication and citation data for no less than 1,750…

Ruscio and colleagues (Ruscio, Seaman, D'Oriano, Stremlo, & Mahalchik, this issue) have done a great service by systematically comparing indices of scholarly impact. Three aspects of their work are particularly valuable: (1) Their assessment of the proliferating collection of metrics, whose development has become something of a cottage industry,…

In their article Ruscio et al. (Ruscio, Seaman, D'Oriano, Stremlo, & Mahalchik, this issue) present a comparative study of some of the different variants of the "h" index. The study evaluates a total of 22 metrics, including the "h" index and "h"-type indices, as well as other conventional measures. The novelty of their work is to a large extent…

Describing, explaining, and discussing various modern indices of scholarly impact as accomplished by Ruscio, Seaman, D'Oriano, Stremlo, and Mahalchik (this issue) is highly commendable, as such measures get increasingly important in hiring and promotion decisions. The author agrees with almost all points made in the target article, except the…

This article investigates several questions regarding the impact of different item formats on measurement characteristics. Constructed response (CR) items and multiple choice (MC) items obviously differ in their formats and in the resources needed to score them. As such, they have been the subject of considerable discussion regarding the impact of…

In this article, the history of linking is summarized, and current linking frameworks that have been proposed are considered. Key publications discussed include Flanagan (1951), Angoff (1971), Linn (1993), Mislevy (1992), and Feuer, Holland, Green, Bertenthal, and Hemphill (1999). The article further focuses on the concordance situation for…