The growing presence of computer-based testing has brought with it the capability to routinely capture the time that test takers spend on individual test items. This, in turn, has led to an increased interest in potential applications of response time in measuring intellectual ability and achievement. Goldhammer (this issue) provides a very useful overview of much of the research in this area, and he provides a thoughtful analysis of the speed-ability trade-off and its impact on measurement.

This study examined the utility of response time-based analyses in understanding the behavior of unmotivated test takers. For an adaptive achievement test, patterns of observed rapid-guessing behavior and item response accuracy were compared to the behavior expected under several types of models that have been proposed to represent unmotivated test taking behavior.

Most of us believe that when individuals have goals, their performance improves, and this belief is being put to the test in schools today. In an effort to create alignment between district and school improvement efforts, teachers are more likely than ever to have formal performance goals.

In this article, the authors explain how CAT provides a more precise, accurate picture of the achievement levels of both low-achieving and high-achieving students by adjusting questions as the testing goes along. The immediate, informative test results enable teachers to differentiate instruction to meet individual students’ current academic needs.

When New York state released the first results of the exams under the Common Core State Standards, many wrongly believed that the results showed dramatic declines in student achievement. A closer look at the results showed that student achievement may have increased.

This integrative review examines the motivational benefits of computerized adaptive tests (CATs), and demonstrates that they can have important advantages over conventional tests in both identifying instances when examinees are exhibiting low effort, and effectively addressing the validity threat posed by unmotivated examinees.

This study, using real data, provides empirical evidence of construct and invariance construct of MAP scales across grades at different academic calendars for 10 different states.