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

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

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychology

VOLUME=Volume 12 - 2021

YEAR=2021

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.662192

DOI=10.3389/fpsyg.2021.662192

ISSN=1664-1078

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 equivalent random groups design with internal anchor items. Local independence was attested via standardized residual Pearson bivariate correlation. First, from 176 items, we selected 42 in each form (33 unique and 9 in common) using 2PL one-dimensional item response theory models. Using the equateIRT package for R, the anchor items were used to link both forms. Equating coefficients were estimated under four different methods (mean-mean, mean-sigma, Haebara, and Stocking-Lord), resulting in scores linked by two methods: observed score equating and true score equating. We provided reference 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.