Abstract
Likert or rating scales may elicit an extreme response style (ERS), which means that responses to scales do not reflect the ability that is meant to be measured. Research has shown that the presence of ERS could lead to biased scores and thus influence the accuracy of differential item functioning (DIF) detection. In this study, a new method under the multiple-indicators multiple-causes (MIMIC) framework is proposed as a means to eliminate the impact of ERS in DIF detection. The findings from a series of simulations showed that a difference in ERS between groups caused inflated false-positive rates and deflated true-positive rates in DIF detection when ERS was not taken into account. The modified MIMIC model, as compared to conventional MIMIC, logistic discriminant function analysis, ordinal logistic regression, and their extensions, could control false-positive rates across situations and yielded trustworthy true-positive rates. An empirical example from a study of Chinese marital resilience was analyzed to demonstrate the proposed model.
Highlights
Likert or rating scales may elicit an extreme response style (ERS), which means that responses to scales do not reflect the ability that is meant to be measured
Response styles (RSs) are prevalent phenomena in survey research, which refer to participants showing systematic patterns when answering questionnaires that are irrelevant to the item content
MIMICVar was robust against the increment of ERS differences and consistently yielded appropriate false-positive rates (FPRs)
Summary
Likert or rating scales may elicit an extreme response style (ERS), which means that responses to scales do not reflect the ability that is meant to be measured. The most common RSs discussed in the literature are the extreme response style (ERS) and its opposite, mild RS, or MLRS (van Vaerenbergh & Thomas, 2012). ERS respondents primarily select the extremes of a rating scale, whereas MLRS respondents tend to avoid extreme response categories and often choose the middle range of response categories. When given a survey using a 5-point Likert scale, respondents who tend to choose either the lowest (e.g., 0 = strongly disagree) or the highest (4 = strongly disagree) category are referred to as high-ERS respondents, whereas those who choose the middle categories (1 = disagree, 2 = neither agree nor disagree, and 3 = agree) are classified as MLRS respondents (Cheung & Rensvold, 2000). Blacks are more likely to agree with statements and tend to use the extremes of the scale more often than whites
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