Validity Of Arguments Research Articles

How argumentation theory can inform assessment validity: A critical review.

Many health professions education (HPE) scholars frame assessment validity as a form of argumentation in which interpretations and uses of assessment scores must be supported by evidence. However, what are purported to be validity arguments are often merely clusters of evidence without a guiding framework to evaluate, prioritise, or debate their merits. Argumentation theory is a field of study dedicated to understanding the production, analysis, and evaluation of arguments (spoken or written). The aim of this study is to describe argumentation theory, articulating the unique insights it can offer to HPE assessment, and presenting how different argumentation orientations can help reconceptualize the nature of validity in generative ways. The authors followed a five-step critical review process consisting of iterative cycles of focusing, searching, appraising, sampling, and analysing the argumentation theory literature. The authors generated and synthesised a corpus of manuscripts on argumentation orientations deemed to be most applicable to HPE. We selected two argumentation orientations that we considered particularly constructive for informing HPE assessment validity: New rhetoric and informal logic. In new rhetoric, the goal of argumentation is to persuade, with a focus on an audience's values and standards. Informal logic centres on identifying, structuring, and evaluating arguments in real-world settings, with a variety of normative standards used to evaluate argument validity. Both new rhetoric and informal logic provide philosophical, theoretical, or practical groundings that can advance HPE validity argumentation. New rhetoric's foregrounding of audience aligns with HPE's social imperative to be accountable to specific stakeholders such as the public and learners. Informal logic provides tools for identifying and structuring validity arguments for analysis and evaluation.

Validity Arguments Meet Artificial Intelligence in Innovative Educational Assessment

AbstractWe have dramatically advanced our ability to create rich, complex, and effective assessments across a range of uses through technology advancement. Artificial Intelligence (AI) enabled assessments represent one such area of advancement—one that has captured our collective interest and imagination. Scientists and practitioners within the domains of organizational and workforce assessment have increasingly used AI in assessment, and its use is now becoming more common in education. While these types of solutions offer their users the promise of efficiency, effectiveness, and a “wow factor,” users need to maintain high standards for validity and fairness in high stakes settings. Due to the complexity of some AI methods and tools, this requirement for adherence to standards may challenge our traditional approaches to building validity and fairness arguments. In this edition, we review what these challenges may look like as validity arguments meet AI in educational assessment domains. We specifically explore how AI impacts Evidence‐Centered Design (ECD) and development from assessment concept and coding to scoring and reporting. We also present information on ways to ensure that bias is not built into these systems. Lastly, we discuss future horizons, many that are almost here, for maximizing what AI offers while minimizing negative effects on test takers and programs.

A two-phase model that unifies and extends the classical models of membrane transport.

Two models describe solvent transport through swollen, nonporous membranes. The pore-flow model, based on fluid mechanics, works for porous membranes, whereas the solution-diffusion model invokes molecular diffusion to treat nonporous membranes. Both approaches make valid arguments for swollen polymer membranes, but they disagree in their predictions of intramembrane pressure and concentration profiles. Using a fluid-solid model that treats the solvent and membrane matrix as separate phases, we show both classical models to be valid, to represent complementary approaches to the same phenomenon, and to make identical predictions. The fluid-solid model clarifies recent reverse osmosis measurements; provides a predictive and mechanistic basis for empirical high-pressure limiting flux phenomena, in quantitative agreement with classic measurements; and gives a framework to treat nonporous but mechanically heterogeneous membrane materials.

Adopting green and sustainable practices in the hotel industry operations- an analysis of critical performance indicators for improved environmental quality

PurposeThis study aims to address the adoption issues of green and sustainable practices in the hotel industry. The study identifies critical performance indicators (CPIs) and utilizes Hotel Carbon Management Initiative (HCMI) framework to prioritize CPIs for achieving a robust adoption framework for green and sustainable practices.Design/methodology/approachThe hotel industry is driven by changing ecological degradation, and it is necessary to achieve feasible development goals. This research article formulates the CPIs derived from HCMI and decision-making model is created using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP).FindingsIn this research, CPIs of HCMI are considered and aim to formulate five major CPIs of HCMI, namely air pollution, energy efficiency, water conservation, noise pollution and waste management. The study identifies the need for better control and sustainable growth in the Indian hotel industry with minimum carbon emissions coupled with the green approach adoption.Research limitations/implicationsThe CPIs work on minimization of risks and maximizing optimality of return on investment. The development of the hotel industry will be improved and immensely welcomed by capping the carbon emission with the green initiatives. This research is limited as urban hotels are surveyed in this study.Originality/valueThis work makes a valid argument to establish HCMI as a model initiative for environment quality improvement and further extension of other activities in the hospitality sector and scale-up sustainable practices for future-ready circular economies.

Some Remarks on the Notion of Paradox

This paper argues that the traditional characterization of the notion of paradox — an apparently valid argument with apparently true premises and an apparently false conclusion — is too narrow; there are paradoxes that do not satisfy it. After discussing, and discarding, some alternatives, an outline of a new characterization of the notion of paradox is presented. A paradox is found to be an apparently valid argument such that, apparently, it does not present the kind of commitment to the conclusion that should be implied by an acceptance of the truth of the premises and the validity of the argument.

Paradox and context shift

The Liar sentence L, which reads ‘L is not true’, can be used to produce an apparently valid argument proving that L is not true and that L is true. There has been increasing recognition of the appeal of contextualist solutions to the Liar paradox. Contextualist accounts hold that some step in the reasoning induces a context shift that causes the apparently contradictory claims to occur at different contexts. Attempts at identifying the most promising contextualist account often rely on timing arguments, which seek to isolate a step at which the context cannot be claimed to have shifted or must have shifted. The literature contains a number of timing arguments that draw incompatible conclusions about the location of the context shift. I argue that no existing timing arguments succeed. An alternative strategy for assessing contextualist accounts evaluates the plausibility of their explanations of why the context shifts. However, even this strategy yields no clear verdict about which contextualist account is the most promising. I conclude that there are some grounds for optimism and for pessimism about the potential to adequately motivate contextualism.

Supporting argumentation in mathematics classrooms

Reform movements in mathematics education advocate that mathematical argumentation play a central role in all classrooms. However, research shows that mathematics teachers at all grade level find it challenging to support argumentation in mathematics classrooms. This study examines the role of teachers’ mathematical knowledge in teachers’ support of argumentation in mathematics classroom. The study addresses a documented need for a better understanding of the relationship between mathematical knowledge for teaching and instruction by focusing on how the knowledge influences teachers’ support of argumentation. The results provide insights into particular aspects of teachers’ mathematical knowledge that influence teachers’ support of students’ development of valid mathematical arguments in mathematics classrooms and suggest implications for research and practice.

Analysis of the Meaning of the Word Sayyid In the Qur'an and al-Hadis

There should be a valid argument for worship before it can be practiced. If it is not obligatory to leave it, it is enough and complete the Qur'an and hadith, why are you still looking for a rational argument that contradicts the naql argument. There are 3 meanings of sayyid in the Qur'an, namely follower, husband and leader. Sayyid ah is termed in Indonesia as (siti) is the wife, there is a queen in heaven, if a man is called the king (the term local adat title, meaning it is permissible to call kiyai, Buyya, ustad, Baleo and others, it means that academic degrees such as Dr, Ph.D, may hold positions such as president, may title abri such as generals. The meaning of sayid is lower than the name given by Allah, namely Muhammad, Ahmad, 'Abdun Rosul Nabi and ummi. The use of the word sayyid or sayyid ah in worship has not found the evidence. If it is better, add the word Of course the monotheism sentence becomes: لااله الا الله سيدنا محمد رسول الله, it is also possible to pronounce the shahada to Muhammad as: وأشهد أن سيدنا محمدا عبده ورسوله, and the reading in the adhan iqamah and others, may also be the name of the surah سيدنا محمد and every word added with the word Muhammad سيدنا

A Framework for Addressing Instrumentation Biases When Using Observation Systems as Outcome Measures in Instructional Interventions

Many educational interventions seek to change teachers’ instructional practice. Standards-based observation systems are a common and useful tool to understand these interventions’ impact, but the process of measuring instructional change with observation systems is highly complex. This paper introduces a framework for examining and understanding potential instrumentation biases that arise when evaluations use observation systems to understand instructional change. The framework systematizes two processes that all studies must undertake: (1) the process of operationalizing the construct of teaching quality, and (2) the process of data collection. A study that engages in these processes generates observation scores that capture their own raters’ perspectives on specific segments of instruction. These scores must be generalized to draw conclusions about the intended constructs and settings. Systematizing these two processes highlights the necessary steps of a validity argument supporting evaluation conclusions and the instrumentation biases that threaten such conclusions. The framework is illustrated with an example from our recent work, which sought to understand instructional change since the adoption of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS).

Validity Arguments Meet Artificial Intelligence in Innovative Educational Assessment: A Discussion and Look Forward

AbstractIn this concluding article of the special issue, we provide an overall discussion and point to future emerging trends in AI that might shape our approach to validity and building validity arguments.

Validity Arguments for AI‐Based Automated Scores: Essay Scoring as an Illustration

AbstractIn this article, we argue that automated scoring engines should be transparent and construct relevant—that is, as much as is currently feasible. Many current automated scoring engines cannot achieve high degrees of scoring accuracy without allowing in some features that may not be easily explained and understood and may not be obviously and directly relevant to the target assessment construct. We address the current limitations on evidence and validity arguments for scores from automated scoring engines from the points of view of the Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing (i.e., construct relevance, construct representation, and fairness) and emerging principles in Artificial Intelligence (e.g., explainable AI, an examinee's right to explanations, and principled AI). We illustrate these concepts and arguments for automated essay scores.

Medical Council of Canada Qualifying Examinations and performance in future practice.

The purpose of medical licensing examinations is to protect the public from practitioners who do not have adequate knowledge, skills, and abilities to provide acceptable patient care, and therefore evaluating the validity of these examinations is a matter of accountability. Our objective was to discuss the Medical Council of Canada's Qualifying Examinations (MCCQEs) Part I (QE1) and Part II (QE2) in terms of how well they reflect future performance in practice.We examined the supposition that satisfactory performance on the MCCQEs are important determinants of practice performance and, ultimately, patient outcomes. We examined the literature before the implementation of the QE2 (pre-1992), post QE2 but prior to the implementation of the new Blueprint (1992-2018), and post Blueprint (2018-present).The literature suggests that MCCQE performance is predictive of future physician behaviours, that the relationship between examination performance and outcomes did not attenuate with practice experience, and that associations between examination performance and outcomes made sense clinically.While the evidence suggests the MCC qualifying examinations measure the intended constructs and are predictive of future performance, the validity argument is never complete. As new competency requirements emerge, we will need to develop valid and reliable mechanisms for determining practice readiness in these areas.

“But the vanilla is healthy!” Children's expression of arguments to justify their non-compliances in family conversation

This study aims to explore how children express their need to account for actions by using valid arguments in order to prevent the non-compliance of a rule within family conversation. Previous works have shown the relevance of parental requests towards children and the need to account for a violation or for incorrect verbal expressions. The present case study is based on the argumentative analysis of a corpus of data concerning a family, within a large set of recordings of 76 dinners, held by 23 Italian middle-class families selected on the grounds of similar criteria. We specifically focused on the observation of a family in which children are accounting for their actions to verbally justify the non-compliance of a rule indicated by a parent. Findings indicate that children express a variety of arguments to justify their non-compliances with a parental directive: in the case of young children (3–6 years old), their justifications can be considered as the beginning of argumentative reasoning skills. The results of this study bring further light on the actual knowledge of argumentative interactions and the interplay between the expression of justifications and the argumentative skills of children to account for their non-compliances within the family arena.

The question of assisted dying

Henry Marsh breaks down the arguments against assisted dying and looks at whether these are valid arguments.

Toward Argument‐Based Fairness with an Application to AI‐Enhanced Educational Assessments

AbstractThe field of educational measurement places validity and fairness as central concepts of assessment quality. Prior research has proposed embedding fairness arguments within argument‐based validity processes, particularly when fairness is conceived as comparability in assessment properties across groups. However, we argue that a more flexible approach to fairness arguments that occurs outside of and complementary to validity arguments is required to address many of the views on fairness that a set of assessment stakeholders may hold. Accordingly, we focus this manuscript on two contributions: (a) introducing the argument‐based fairness approach to complement argument‐based validity for both traditional and artificial intelligence (AI)‐enhanced assessments and (b) applying it in an illustrative AI assessment of perceived hireability in automated video interviews used to prescreen job candidates. We conclude with recommendations for further advancing argument‐based fairness approaches.

Logic and Economics I: Synthesis Neoclassicism

ABSTRACT Economic theory has two inter-related, desiderata — valid argumentation, and scientific explanations of relevant realities. This paper explores whether these objectives can be achieved with a widely-deployed form of Neoclassical economics. Applying arguments drawn from logic to this type of theorizing produces far-reaching conclusions.

Anchoring Validity Evidence for Automated Essay Scoring

AbstractOne of the challenges of discussing validity arguments for machine scoring of essays centers on the absence of a commonly held definition and theory of good writing. At best, the algorithms attempt to measure select attributes of writing and calibrate them against human ratings with the goal of accurate prediction of scores for new essays. Sometimes these attributes are based on the fundamentals of writing (e.g., fluency), but quite often they are based on locally developed rubrics that may be confounded with specific content coverage expectations. This lack of transparency makes it difficult to provide systematic evidence that machine scoring is assessing writing, but slices or correlates of writing performance.

PROFIL HIGHER ORDER THINKING SKILLS MATEMATIS PESERTA DIDIK KELAS VIII SMP

This study aims to describe the mathematical higher-order thinking skills of eighth-grade students in junior high school. This research is descriptive research with a qualitative approach. The research subjects were 2 students of class VIII SMP Negeri 1 Palu. Data collection techniques include tests and interviews. The results obtained indicate that at the level of analytical thinking, students only apply problem-solving procedures without analyzing (C4) the principles that are relevant to the given problem. At the level of evaluating thinking (C5), students can provide valid arguments in verifying the given problem. While at the creative thinking level (C6), students cannot find work ideas to solving the problems presented

Reversing logical nihilism

Gillian Russell has recently proposed counterexamples to such elementary argument forms as Conjunction Introduction (e.g. ‘Snow is white. Grass is green. Therefore, snow is white and grass is green’) and Identity (e.g. ‘Snow is white. Therefore, snow is white’). These purported counterexamples involve expressions that are sensitive to linguistic context—for example, a sentence which is true when it appears alone but false when embedded in a larger sentence. If they are genuine counterexamples, it looks as though logical nihilism—the view that there are no valid argument forms—might be true. In this paper, I argue that the purported counterexamples are not genuine, on the grounds that they equivocate. Having defused the threat of logical nihilism, I argue that the kind of linguistic context sensitivity at work in Russell’s purported counterexamples, if taken seriously, far from leading to logical nihilism, reveals new, previously undreamt-of valid forms. By way of proof of concept I present a simple logic, Solo-Only Propositional Logic (SOPL), designed to capture some of them. Along the way, some interesting subtleties about the fallacy of equivocation are revealed.

Examining the validity argument for the Ottawa Surgical Competency Operating Room Evaluation (OSCORE): a systematic review and narrative synthesis.

The Ottawa Surgical Competency Operating Room Evaluation (OSCORE) is an assessment tool that has gained prominence in postgraduate competency-based training programs. We undertook a systematic review and narrative synthesis to articulate the underlying validity argument in support of this tool. Although originally developed to assess readiness for independent performance of a procedure, contemporary implementation includes using the OSCORE for entrustment supervision decisions. We used systematic review methodology to search, identify, appraise and abstract relevant articles from 2005 to September 2020, across MEDLINE, EMBASE and Google Scholar databases. Nineteen original, English-language, quantitative or qualitative articles addressing the use of the OSCORE for health professionals' assessment were included. We organized and synthesized the validity evidence according to Kane's framework, articulating the validity argument and identifying evidence gaps. We demonstrate a reasonable validity argument for the OSCORE in surgical specialties, based on assessing surgical competence as readiness for independent performance for a given procedure, which relates to ad hoc, retrospective, entrustment supervision decisions. The scoring, generalization and extrapolation inferences are well-supported. However, there is a notable lack of implications evidence focused on the impact of the OSCORE on summative decision-making within surgical training programs. In non-surgical specialties, the interpretation/use argument for the OSCORE has not been clearly articulated. The OSCORE has been reduced to a single-item global rating scale, and there is limited validity evidence to support its use in workplace-based assessment. Widespread adoption of the OSCORE must be informed by concurrent data collection in more diverse settings and specialties.