Reading Comprehension Tests for Children: Test Equating and Specific Age-Interval Reports.

Patrícia Silva Lúcio,Deborah Bandalos,Clara Regina Brandão De Ávila,Carolina Alves Ferreira De Carvalho,Adriana De Souza Batista Kida,Hugo Cogo-Moreira,Fausto Coutinho Lourenço

doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2021.662192

Abstract

Equating is used to directly compare alternate forms of tests. We describe the equating of two alternative forms of a reading comprehension test for Brazilian children (2nd to 5th grade), Form A (n = 427) and Form B (n = 321). We employed non-equivalent random groups design with internal anchor items. Local independence was attested via standardized residual Pearson's bivariate correlation. First, from 176 items, we selected 42 in each form (33 unique and 9 in common) using 2PL model, a one-dimensional item response theory (IRT) model. Using the equateIRT package for R, the anchor items were used to link both forms. Linking coefficients were estimated under two different methods (Haebara and Stocking–Lord), resulting in scores equating by two methods: observed score equating (OSE) and true score equating (TSE). We provided reference-specific age-intervals for the sample. The final version was informative for a wide range of theta abilities. We concluded that the forms could be used interchangeably.

Highlights

Reading comprehension is a complex skill that depends on different cognitive and linguistic abilities related to the integration of text content to the strategies, expectancies, and previous knowledge of the reader (Cain et al, 2004; Van den Broek et al, 2005)
We tested for local independence of the items through bivariate standardized residual inspection; second, we reported the process of selecting items to calibrate the effect of anchor length (Kolen and Brennan, 2014), where items were selected from results taken from separate 2PL item response theory (IRT) analyzes
We used one of these methods to illustrate the conversion of one form to another; fourth, the observed-score equating (OSE) and IRT true-score equating (TSE) are reported using these two methods; we presented referenced norms based on age-specific intervals for both forms, using the OSE method

Summary

Introduction

Reading comprehension is a complex skill that depends on different cognitive and linguistic abilities (such as word recognition and working memory) related to the integration of text content to the strategies, expectancies, and previous knowledge of the reader (Cain et al, 2004; Van den Broek et al, 2005). Such complexity may be at the core of typical problems that learners face to understand the passages, which may be reinforced by disturbances, such as dyslexia or attention difficulties (Snowling and Stackhouse, 2016). From the nomothetic point of view, it is important to keep interindividual variation (what can be achieved using a heterogenous sample of subjects or using items that inform about different strata of a latent trait)

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