The authors of the Focus article pose important questions regarding whether or not performance-based tasks related to executive functioning are best viewed as reflective or formative indicators. Miyake and Friedman (2012) define executive functioning (EF) as "a set of general-purpose control mechanisms, often linked to the prefrontal cortex…

"Game-Based Assessments: A Promising Way to Create Idiographic Perspectives" (Adrienne Walker and George Englehard) comments on: "How Task Features Impact Evidence from Assessments Embedded in Simulations and Games" by Russell G. Almond, Yoon Jeon Kim, Gertrudes Velasquez, and Valerie J. Shute. Here, Walker and Englehard write…

The authors of the focus article in this issue have emphasized the continuing confusion among some researchers regarding various indicators used in structural equation models (SEMs). Their major claim is that causal indicators are not inherently unstable, and even if they are unstable they are at least not more unstable than other types of…

In this commentary, Englehard and Perkins remark that Maydeu-Olivares has presented a framework for evaluating the goodness of model-data fit for item response theory (IRT) models and correctly points out that overall goodness-of-fit evaluations of IRT models and data are not generally explored within most applications in educational and…

In 2012, Edward Haertel received the NCME Career Contributions Award. The focus article for this issue emerged from his address on the topic "How Is Testing Supposed to Improve Schooling?" His focus article provides a discussion of the relationships between testing and schooling in which he issues a call to action to the measurement community to…

In his article, Paul E. Newton has conducted a review of selected perspectives on validity theory with the goal of disambiguating the definition of validity and describing a consensus definition of validity. Newton provides a nuanced discussion of the evolution of the concept of validity over the years. His Focus article has two major goals: (1)…

Humphry (this issue) has written a thought-provoking piece on the interpretation of item discrimination parameters as scale units in item response theory. One of the key features of his work is the description of an item response theory (IRT) model that he calls the logistic measurement function that combines aspects of two traditions in IRT that…

The Black, Wilson, and Yao (this issue) provide a wide-ranging commentary and vision of the interrelationships among curriculum, pedagogy, and assessment. Specifically, they describe how the Berkeley Evaluation & Assessment Research (BEAR) Center Assessment System can be used to integrate and systematize these areas. This commentary focuses on…

Coburn and Turner (this issue) present an intriguing framework for understanding how data has come to be used in the current high accountability environments in education. In this framework, they connect various processes of data use within organizational and political contexts. Data use is presented using an ecological perspective that deepens…

The major purpose of my focus article was to stimulate discussion regarding the concept of invariant measurement. My intent was to provide a historical lens for considering how our views of invariant measurement have evolved over time through the work of three key measurement theorists: Guttman, Rasch, and Mokken. The commentators have offered a…

The purpose of this study is to describe how Guttman, Rasch, and Mokken approached issues related to invariant measurement. These measurement theorists were chosen to illustrate the evolution of our conceptualizations of invariant measurement during the 20th century within the research tradition of item response theory. Item response theory can be…

In this journal issue, the authors of the focus articles have provided a suite of very stimulating and thoughtful articles. The overarching purpose of this research is to explore the application of principles derived from the view of validity proposed by Kane (2004) to their research on issues related to the measurement of mathematical knowledge…