ACER has contributed to the development of measurement theory and methods over many years. This series contains works by ACER authors, and by partner organisations such as the Institute for Objective Measurement (IOM) who have granted permission for the Australian Council for Educational Research to digitise texts for use by students and researchers.
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ACER Quest: the interactive test analysis system. Version 2.1.
Ray Adams and Siek-Toon Khoo
This is a guide to using Quest. Quest offers a comprehensive test and questionnaire analysis environment by providing a data analyst with access to the most recent developments in Rasch measurement theory, as well as a range of traditional analysis procedures. It includes an easy to use control language with flexible and informative output. Quest can be used to construct and validate variables based on both dichotomous and polychotomous observations. It scores and analyses such instruments as multiple choice tests, Likert type rating scales, short answer items, and partial credit items.
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Adaptive testing, information and the partial credit model: A simulation study
Raymond J. Adams
In adaptive testing each individual is tested with a set of items that is selected to match his/her estimated ability at the time of testing. In its most sophisticated form an adaptive test is interactively administered by a computer that scores the test and uses the individual's pattern of correct and incorrect responses to select new items from an item bank. In this procedure items are selected during the process of administering a test (rather than as a part of a predetermined sequence) so that the items administered to each individual are appropriate in difficulty for that individual. The result is a test that is matched to each individual's ability and the test is neither too easy nor too difficult. In this form adaptive testing requires application of both computer technology and latent trait theory. This report works on extending adaptive testing to include the Rating Scale Model (RSM) (Andrich, 1978) and Partial Credit Model (PCM) (Masters, 1982), two Rasch models that allow items to be scored in ordered categories. It focuses on the nature of the information functions for the RSM and the PCM and the likely implications for adaptive testing, and reports on some simulations with RSM and PCM item banks each with items scored in three response categories.
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Rating scale analysis
Benjamin D. Wright and Geofferey N. Masters
This book is a text about constructing variables and making measures. The basis is the measurement philosophy of G. Rasch. The text begins by outlining the essentials for measurement, examining data and developing models for measuring, and covers estimation procedures, verifying variables and supervising measures. The authors extend Rasch item analysis and person measurement to attitude questionnaires, performance ratings and other ordered category data.
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Best test design
Benjamin D. Wright and Mark H. Stone
This handbook for learning how to do Rasch measurement contains both theoretical explanation and practice problems. It is about how to make use of mental tests, and covers the measurement model, item calibration by hand and by computer, the analysis of fit, and constructing a variable. Final chapters work through designing tests, making measures and choosing a scale.