This study analyzes the Object Categorization Test (OCT) and the Picture Categorization Test (PCT) to provide (1) psychometric analysis of the tests, (2) substantive analysis detailing variation in performance level as a function of age, race, class, and sex, and (3) normative data yielding frequencies of various score patterns. Data was taken…

A wealth of instructional information is intrinsic to standardized achievement tests. Most practioners fail to realize the availability or potential of item analysis information or are unable to utilize such information appropriately. Achievement tests have not fully accomplished their purposes if the information derived stops at just test scores…

Empirical results are presented as regards the implementation of a latent-trait psychometric model by means of conditional maximum likelihood estimation. Items are scored polychotomously into varying numbers of nominal categories and the test and item characteristic curves and information functions are examined. It is concluded that scoring items…

Sixty subjects participated in an experiment involving estimation of difficulty of items in a test of reasoning ability. The estimates were to be given both according to conventional conditions of magnitude estimations with a preassigned comparison standard and according to a modified procedure of magnitude estimation where the comparison standard…

This study examined the nature of reading comprehension to determine if the process is best described as a unitary ability or in terms of multiple skills that can be identified and measured. Test items were constructed to measure each of the comprehension skills selected for investigation: (1) remembering word meanings, (2) inferring word meanings…

Five-hundred dichotomously scored response patterns were generated with sequentially independent (SI) items and 500 with dependent (SD) items for each of thirty-six combinations of sampling parameters (i.e., three test lengths, three sample sizes, and four item difficulty distributions). KR-20, KR-21, and Split-Half (S-H) reliabilities were…

Four new methods of item analysis were used to select subsets of items which would yield measures of attitude change. The sample consisted of 263 students at Michigan State University who were tested on the Inventory of Beliefs as freshmen and retested on the same instrument as juniors. Item change scores and total change scores were computed for…

Several samples of Black and White students were drawn from the 1970 PSAT administration in Georgia and studied for item x race interaction on both the verbal and mathematical sections of the test. When subsamples of candidates were drawn from their respective racial groups, matched on mathematical for the study of verbal items and matched on…

Specially constructed "speeded" and "unspeeded" forms of a Reading Comprehension section of the Law School Admission Test (LSAT) were administered to regular center and fee-free center LSAT candidates in an effort to determine: (1) if the test was more speeded for fee-free candidates, and (2) if reducing the amount of…

This study examined relationships among conformity to biographical item writing rules, rated stability, and obtained response stability. First and second administration data were collected and a stability index was obtained on 88 items using a college freshmen sample (N=106). One group of judges then educed rules to discriminate between the more…

A 30-item multiple-choice word analogy test and a corresponding 30-item picture analogy test (in which the pictures corresponded to the words in the word analogy test) were administered to 289 Civil Service employees. The equivalence of semantic (word) and figural (picture) test presentation of the same items was determined by comparing the…

This manual has four purposes. They are: (1) to list test analysis services available to teachers, (2) to explain information on the analysis printouts, (3) to provide help in interpreting analysis results, and (4) to suggest possible uses of test analysis data. It is noted that test analyses services are available to teachers for teacher-made…

A detailed description of the Staff Sentiment Scale (SSS) is given. In addition, a brief description of the Conceptual Model, upon which the SSS is based, is given. The model is based on an extensive review of the literature of organizational theory and differentiated staffing and upon systematic observations in schools. It treats Process…

Efforts to develop a collection of reading test items suitable for measuring adult literacy are described. The project, part of Project I of the Targeted Research and Development Program in Reading, sought to identify characteristics of literacy levels and to define tasks which might be used in a criterion-referenced test to assess possession of…

A traditional generalization is that girls are superior in verbal skills and boys in mathematics and the sciences. But most specialists in this area now concede that there is almost more exception than rule in this generalization, and that individual test items may actually modify observed patterns of sex differences. Sex role stereotyping and the…