Natural category learning is important in science education. One strategy that has been empirically supported for enhancing category learning is testing, which facilitates not only the learning of previously studied information (backward testing effect) but also the learning of newly studied information (forward testing effect). However, in…

The artificial intelligence chatbot ChatGPT was used to answer questions from final exams administered in two general chemistry courses, including questions with closed-response format and with open-response format. For closed-response questions, ChatGPT was very capable at identifying the concept even when the question included a great deal of…

The Force Concept Inventory (FCI) is one of the research-based assessments established by the physics education research community to measure students' understanding of Newtonian mechanics. Former works have often recorded the notion of gendered mean FCI scores favoring male students notably in the North American (NA) based studies. Nevertheless,…

This article provides a process to carefully evaluate the suitability of a content domain for which diagnostic classification models (DCMs) could be applicable and then optimized steps for constructing a test blueprint for applying DCMs and a real-life example illustrating this process. The content domains were carefully evaluated using a set of…

There is no need or point to testing of knowledge, attributes, traits, behaviours or abilities of an individual if information obtained from the test is inaccurate. However, by and large, it seems the estimation of psychometric properties of test items in classroomshas been completely ignored otherwise dying slowly in most testing environments. In…

Previous studies noted the scantiness of diagnostic instruments for the assessment of students' understanding of fundamental biochemistry concepts. Consequently, within this study, a four-tier test for the examination of secondary school students' conceptual understanding of amino acids, proteins, and enzymes has been developed. Items in the test…

In the era defined by the fourth paradigm of science research, the burgeoning volume of science data poses a formidable challenge. The established data-related requisites within science literacy now fall short of addressing the evolving needs of researchers and STEM students. Consequently, the emergence of science data literacy becomes imperative.…

[This paper is part of the Focused Collection on Qualitative Methods in PER: A Critical Examination.] Identifying student ideas about particular physics topics is one of the earliest and longest-standing foci of physics education research. This paper presents a method for identifying common conceptual resources for understanding physics, using…

Practice examinations developed at the ACS Examinations Institute ask students to self-report mental effort when answering items. This self-reported mental effort together with performance can be represented in the form of a cognitive efficiency graph for each student giving information on the utilization of cognitive resources and content…

With the already widespread nature of multiple-choice assessments and the increasing popularity of answer-until-correct, it is important to have methods available for exploring the validity of these types of assessments as they are developed. This work analyzes a 20-question multiple choice assessment covering introductory undergraduate chemistry…

Cultivating students' enjoyment of science is one of the significant aims of science education. However, it seems challenging to achieve this goal in most countries or economies. Using the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) 2019 Hong Kong data, this study aims to identify multiple configurations of school conditions to…

This study aims to obtain and compare the opinions of exam question writers and teachers on skill-based exam questions. 24 science teachers and 11 context-based exam question writers participated in the study, which was carried out according to the convergent parallel design. Opinions of both parties on the skill-based exam questions were…

Using multiple versions of an assessment has the potential to introduce item environment effects. These types of effects result in version dependent item characteristics (i.e., difficulty and discrimination). Methods to detect such effects and resulting implications are important for all levels of assessment where multiple forms of an assessment…

This study examines the relationship between two secondary End of Course (EOC) exams, the Biology EOC and the English I EOC exams, and their impact on Emergent Bilingual (EB) students in a small district in South Texas. This study is a mixed methods study which uses both quantitative and qualitative data to answer three research questions: (a)…

In order to ensure content validity by covering a broad range of content domains, the testing times of some educational large-scale assessments last up to a total of two hours or more. Performance decline over the course of taking the test has been extensively documented in the literature. It can occur due to increases in the numbers of: (a)…