Background Previous studies have shown that social climate in therapeutic residential youth care (TRC) is important to the welfare of residents, staff, and assessing treatment outcomes. The most influential theory on social climate in residential settings is the theory of Moos. The measurement of the concepts and aspects of this theory using the Community Oriented Programs Environment Scale (CO...

The Self-Monitoring Scale (SMS) was investigated utilizing item response theory (IRT). First, IRT models that constrained each of the subscale items to have equal discrimination were fitted to the three subscales of the SMS (Acting, Extraversion, and Other-Directedness). These models were then contrasted with separate models that allowed the discriminations to be estimated freely. For all three...

The DA-T Gibbs sampler is proposed by Maris and Maris (2002) as a Bayesian estimation method for a wide variety of Item Response Theory (IRT) models. The present paper provides an expository account of the DAT Gibbs sampler for the 2PL model. However, the scope is not limited to the 2PL model. It is demonstrated how the DA-T Gibbs sampler for the 2PL may be used to build, quite easily, Gibbs sa...

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE To develop computerized adaptive tests (CATs) designed to assess lower extremity functional status (FS) in people with lower extremity impairments using items from the Lower Extremity Functional Scale and compare discriminant validity of FS measures generated using all items analyzed with a rating scale Item Response Theory model (theta(IRT)) and measures generated usin...

The randomized response (RR) technique is often used to obtain answers on sensitive questions. A new method is developed to measure latent variables using the RR technique because direct questioning leads to biased results. Within the RR technique is the probability of the true response modeled by an item response theory (IRT) model. The RR technique links the observed item response with the tr...

The application of psychological measures often results in item response data that arguably are consistent with both unidimensional (a single common factor) and multidimensional latent structures (typically caused by parcels of items that tap similar content domains). As such, structural ambiguity leads to seemingly endless "confirmatory" factor analytic studies in which the research question i...

The objective of this research is to study various assessment methods used in modern test systems. Methods based on classical test theory and IRT (item response theory) have been considered in this paper. The approaches to improve the quality of assessment of the ability level as a function of the diversity of evaluation points have been proposed. Statistical analysis packages SPSS, the tests a...

The main purpose of this paper is to examine the psychometric properties of the original five-point CWEQ II using Item Response Theory (IRT) methods, followed by an examination of the revised three-point CWEQ II. (1) Background: The psychometric properties of the CWEQ II have not been previously assessed using more robust techniques such as IRT. (2) Methods: This is a secondary analysis of base...

INTRODUCTION We present an ordinal logistic regression model for identification of items with differential item functioning (DIF) and apply this model to a Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) dataset. We employ item response theory ability estimation in our models. Three nested ordinal logistic regression models are applied to each item. Model testing begins with examination of the statistical...

There is considerable need for accurate suicide risk assessment for clinical, screening, and research purposes. This study applied the tripartite affect-behavior-cognition theory, the suicidal barometer model, classical test theory, and item response theory (IRT), to develop a brief self-report measure of suicide risk that is theoretically-grounded, reliable and valid. An initial survey (n = 35...