Open AccessDOES GUESSING REALLY HELP?
Author(s) -
Angoff William H.
Publication year - 1987
Publication title -
ets research report series
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.235
H-Index - 5
ISSN - 2330-8516
DOI - 10.1002/j.2330-8516.1987.tb00220.x
Subject(s) - section (typography) , statistics , mathematics , zero (linguistics) , index (typography) , psychology , mathematics education , arithmetic , computer science , linguistics , philosophy , world wide web , operating system
This study examined the claim that attempting, or guessing at, more items yields improved formula scores. Two samples of students who had taken a form of the SAT‐verbal consisting of three parallel half‐hour sections were used to form the following scores on each of the three sections: the number of attempts, a guessing index, the formula score, and (indirectly) an approximation to an ability score. Correlations were obtained separately for the two samples between the attempts (and the guessing index) on one section and the formula score on a second section, partialling out ability as measured on the third section. The partial correlations so obtained hovered near zero, suggesting, contrary to conventional wisdom, that attempting more items and guessing are not helpful in yielding higher formula scores, and that, therefore, formula scoring is not disadvantageous to the student who is less willing to guess and attempt an item that he (she) is not sure of.