Tests & Measurement for People Who (Think They) Hate Tests & Measurement
Third Edition
June 2017 | 448 pages | SAGE Publications, Inc
Using his signature, conversational writing style and straightforward presentation, Neil J. Salkind’s best-selling Tests & Measurement for People Who (Think They) Hate Tests & Measurement guides readers through an overview of categories of tests, the design of tests, the use of tests, and some of the basic social, political, and legal issues that the process of testing involves. The Third Edition includes a new chapter on item response theory, new sections on neuropsychological testing, new cartoons, and additional end-of-chapter exercises. Free online resources accompany the text to make teaching easier and provide students with the practice tools they need to master the material.
A Note to the Student: Why I Wrote This Book
Acknowledgments
About the Author
PART I In the Beginning . . .
1. Why Me-asurement? An Introduction
| A Five-Minute History of Testing |
| So, Why Tests And Measurement? |
| Some Important Reminders |
| How Tests Are Created |
| What Am I Doing in a Tests and Measurement Class? |
| Ten Ways to Use This Book (And Learn About Tests and Measurement at the Same Time!) |
| Glossary |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
PART II The Psychology of Psychometrics
2. One Potato, Two Potatoes . . . Levels of Measurement and Their Importance
| First Things First |
| The Four Horsemen (or Levels) of Measurement |
| A Summary: How Levels of Measurement Differ |
| Okay, so What’s the Lesson Here? |
| The Final Word(s) |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
3. Getting It Right Every Time: Reliability and Its Importance
| Test Scores: Truth or Dare |
| Getting Conceptual |
| If You Know About rXY, Skip This Section . . . |
| Different Flavors of Reliability |
| How Big Is Big? Interpreting Reliability Coefficients |
| Things to Remember |
| And if You Can’t Establish Reliability . . . Then What? |
| Just One More Thing (And It’s a Big One) |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
4. The Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing but the Truth: Validity and Its Importance
| A Bit More About the Truth |
| Different Types of Validity |
| A Last Friendly Word |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
5. Welcome to Lake Wobegon, Where All the Children Are Above Average: Norms and Percentiles
| The Basics: Raw (Scores) to the Bone! |
| Percentiles or Percentile Ranks |
| Stanines (or Stanine Scores) |
| The Standard (Fare) Scores |
| Standing on Your Own: Criterion-Referenced Tests |
| The Standard Error of Measurement |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
6. Item Response Theory—A “New” Kid on the Block
| The Beginnings of Item Response Theory |
| This Is No Regular Curve: The Item Characteristic Curve |
| Test Items We Like—and Test Items We Don’t |
| Understanding the Curve |
| Analyzing Test Data Using IRTPRO |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
PART III The Tao and How of Testing
7. Short-Answer and Completion Items: Baskin Robbins® Has __ Flavors
| When We Use ’Em and What They Look Like |
| How to Write ’Em: The Guidelines |
| The Good and the Bad |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
8. Essay Items: Hope You Can Write
| When We Use ’Em and What They Look Like |
| How to Write Essay Items: The Guidelines |
| The Good and the Bad |
| How to Score Essay Items |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
9. Multiple-Choice Items: Always Pick Answer C and You’ll Be Right About 25% of the Time
| When We Use ’Em and What They Look Like |
| How to Write Multiple-Choice Items: The Guidelines |
| The Good and the Bad |
| Why Multiple-Choice Items Are Not So Good |
| Analyzing Multiple-Choice Items |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
10. Matchmaker, Matchmaker, Make Me a Match: Matching Items
| When We Use ’Em and What They Look Like |
| How to Write ’Em: The Guidelines |
| The Good and the Bad |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
11. True-False Tests: T or F? I Passed My First Measurement Test
| What We Use ’Em for and What They Look Like |
| How to Write ’Em: The Guidelines |
| The Good and the Bad |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
12. Portfolios: Seeing the Big Picture
| What Portfolios Are and How They Work |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
13. So, Tell Me About Your Childhood: Interesting Interviews
| When We Use ’Em and What They Look Like |
| How to Do ’Em: The Guidelines |
| The Good and the Bad |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
PART IV What to Test and How to Test It
14. Achievement Tests: Who Really Discovered America?
| What Achievement Tests Do |
| How Achievement Tests Differ From One Another |
| How to Do It: The ABCs of Creating a Standardized Test |
| The Amazing Table of Specifications |
| What They Are: A Sampling of Achievement Tests and What They Do |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
15. Personality and Neuropsychological Testing: Type A, B, or Me?
| What Personality Tests Are and How They Work |
| Developing Personality Tests |
| What They Are: A Sampling of Personality Tests and What They Do |
| What Neuropsychological Tests Are and How They Are Used |
| Not Just One: The Focus of Neuropsychological Testing |
| Forensic Assessment: The Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing but the Truth |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
16. Aptitude Tests: What’s in Store for Me?
| What Aptitude Tests Do |
| How to Do It: The ABCs of Creating an Aptitude Test |
| Types of Aptitude Tests |
| Some of the Big Ones |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
17. Intelligence Tests: That Rubik’s Cube Is Driving Me Nuts
| The ABCs of Intelligence |
| From the Beginning: (Almost) All About the Stanford–Binet Intelligence Scale |
| And the Fab Five Are . . . |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
18. Career Choices: So You Want to Be a What?
| What Career Development Tests Do |
| Let’s Get Started: The Strong Interest Inventory |
| John Holland and The Self-Directed Search |
| Some Major Caveats: Career Counseling 101 |
| Five Career Tests |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
PART V It’s Not Always as You Think: Issues in Tests and Measurement
19. Test Bias: Fair for Everyone?
| The $64,000 Question: What Is Test Bias? |
| Moving Toward Fair Tests: The Fairtest Movement |
| Models of Test Bias |
| Where It All Started: Test Score Differences Between Black and White American Children |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
20. The Law, Testing, and Ethics: No Child (Should Be) Left Behind and Other Very Interesting Stuff
| No Child Left Behind: What It Is and How It Works |
| The Education for All Handicapped Children Act and the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act: What They Are and How They Work |
| The Truth in Testing Law: High-Stakes Testing |
| Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act: What It Is and How It Works |
| Ethics and Assessment: 10 Things To Remember |
| And More Stuff to Be Concerned About (No, Really) |
| Summary |
| Time to Practice |
| Want to Know More? |
APPENDICES
Appendix A: Your Tests and Measurement Toolkit
Appendix B: The Guide to (Almost) Every Test in the Universe
Appendix C: Answer to Practice Questions
Appendix D: A (Very Brief) Review of the Official Standards for Psychological and Educational Testing
Glossary
References
Index
Supplements
Instructor Resource Site
Password-protected Instructor Resources include the following:
- A Microsoft® Word® test bank is available containing multiple choice, true/false, short answer, for each chapter. The test bank provides you with a diverse range of pre-written options as well as the opportunity for editing any question and/or inserting your own personalized questions to effectively assess students’ progress and understanding.
- Editable, chapter-specific Microsoft® PowerPoint® slides offer you complete flexibility in easily creating a multimedia presentation for your course.
- The solutions manual includes complete answers to the practice problems in the text.
- EXCLUSIVE! Access to certain full-text SAGE journal articles that have been carefully selected for each chapter.
- Lively and stimulating ideas for class activities that can be used in class to reinforce active learning. The activities apply to individual or group projects.
- Chapter-specific discussion questions help launch classroom interaction by prompting students to engage with the material and by reinforcing important content.
Student Study Site
The open-access Student Study Site includes the following:
- Mobile-friendly eFlashcards reinforce understanding of key terms and concepts that have been outlined in the chapters.
- Mobile-friendly web quizzes allow for independent assessment of progress made in learning course material.
- Multimedia links supplement key points within the text.
- EXCLUSIVE! Selected full-text SAGE journal articles expand on concepts in the chapters.
I have taught Test and Measurement before and I found it hard to engage my undergraduate students. This book provides fun and interesting examples that help motivate students, while also presenting clear and comprehensive material for learning.
Facultad de Ciencias Politicas, National Autonomous Univ of Mexico
April 18, 2017