Development and psychometric evaluation of an Azerbaijani-Turkish grammar comprehension test

Abstract

Due to the lack of appropriate developmental language tests in the Azerbaijani-Turkish language, the present study aimed to develop the Azerbaijani-Turkish grammar comprehension test (ATGCT) for children aged 4–6 years and determine its validity and reliability. This study was conducted in three phases. First, the target grammatical structures were extracted during the item generation phase. Second, item reduction and content validity ratio (CVR) were calculated. The content validity index (CVI) was determined after designing the items. This test was administered to typically developing children (TD) (N = 30). Face validity was confirmed and modifications were applied. The second version of the test was performed on 170 TD and 60 children with developmental language disorder (DLD) aged 4–6 years were selected using the random cluster method. Third, item analysis was performed, and eight items were removed. The construct validity, reliability, and ROC analysis of the final form of the test were evaluated. The psychometric properties considered in the study included construct validity (group, gender, and age discriminative validity) and reliability (test–retest, inter-rater, and internal consistency). The final test version contained 56 items and confirmed face validity. The Scale Content Validity was .91, and the Item Content Validity was between .8 and 1. The test showed a content validity ratio of .96, indicating that it assesses appropriate content. The construct validity analysis revealed significant differences between the TD and DLD groups and among the four age groups. Test–retest and inter-rater reliability were significantly correlated. Furthermore, the high correlation between test items (ICC= .90) demonstrated that the ATGCT had excellent internal consistency. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis results indicated that the test had high sensitivity and specificity in all four age groups and effectively distinguished children with TD and those with DLD. In conclusion, based on the psychometric assessment of the test, it appears that the ATGCT has appropriate values for reliability and validity measures, and it can be used as the first suitable and quick test by researchers and clinicians.