Premium
The Relation Between Information‐Processing Variables and Test‐Retest Stability for Questionnaire Items
Author(s) -
Otter Martha E.,
Mellenbergh Gideon J.,
Glopper Kees de
Publication year - 1995
Publication title -
journal of educational measurement
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.917
H-Index - 47
eISSN - 1745-3984
pISSN - 0022-0655
DOI - 10.1111/j.1745-3984.1995.tb00463.x
Subject(s) - respondent , psychology , test (biology) , association (psychology) , reading (process) , cognition , interpretation (philosophy) , correlation , stability (learning theory) , cognitive psychology , relation (database) , social psychology , applied psychology , statistics , computer science , data mining , mathematics , linguistics , machine learning , paleontology , philosophy , geometry , neuroscience , political science , law , psychotherapist , biology , programming language
Recently developed cognitive theories explain why some questionnaire items can be answered in a reliable and valid manner and others cannot. Those theories distinguish two components: (a) the interpretation or understanding of a question and (b) the role of memory. The present study investigates the ability of these two components to forecast the test‐retest association coefficients of 207 pilot questionnaire items used in an international study of reading literacy in which 2 populations were involved: Grade 5 and Grade 2 of primary and secondary education, respectively. The analysis of the data showed that for both populations, both components forecast the relative sizes of the test‐retest correlation coefficients. The results strongly suggest that if one wishes to use questionnaire items in research about relationships, then the items should be as unambiguous as possible. Moreover, the information needed to formulate an answer must be easily accessible in the respondent's memory.