Performance of a Receptive Language Test among Young Children in Madagascar

Language tests developed and validated in one country may lose their desired properties when translated for use in another, possibly resulting in misleading estimates of ability. Using Item Response Theory (IRT) methodology, we assess the performance of a test of receptive vocabulary, the U.S.-valid...

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Main Authors:	Weber, Ann M., Fernald, Lia C. H., Galasso, Emanuela, Ratsifandrihamanana, Lisy
Format:	Journal Article
Language:	en_US
Published:	Public Library of Science 2015
Subjects:	Item Response Theory IRT vocabulary translation dialects basic education
Online Access:	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/23193

id	okr-10986-23193
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-231932021-04-23T14:04:13Z Performance of a Receptive Language Test among Young Children in Madagascar Weber, Ann M. Fernald, Lia C. H. Galasso, Emanuela Ratsifandrihamanana, Lisy Item Response Theory IRT vocabulary translation dialects basic education Language tests developed and validated in one country may lose their desired properties when translated for use in another, possibly resulting in misleading estimates of ability. Using Item Response Theory (IRT) methodology, we assess the performance of a test of receptive vocabulary, the U.S.-validated Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Third Edition (PPVT-III), when translated, adapted, and administered to children 3 to 10 years of age in Madagascar (N = 1372), in the local language (Malagasy). Though Malagasy is considered a single language, there are numerous dialects spoken in Madagascar. Our findings were that test scores were positively correlated with age and indicators of socio-economic status. However, over half (57/96) of items evidenced unexpected response variation and/or bias by local dialect spoken. We also encountered measurement error and reduced differentiation among person abilities when we used the publishers’ recommended stopping rules, largely because we lost the original item ordering by difficulty when we translated test items into Malagasy. Our results suggest that bias and testing inefficiency introduced from the translation of the PPVT can be significantly reduced with the use of methods based on IRT at both the pre-testing and analysis stages. We explore and discuss implications for cross-cultural comparisons of internationally recognized tests, such as the PPVT. 2015-12-03T16:11:50Z 2015-12-03T16:11:50Z 2015-04-01 Journal Article PLoS ONE http://hdl.handle.net/10986/23193 en_US CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo/ World Bank Public Library of Science Publications & Research :: Journal Article Publications & Research Madagascar
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
language	en_US
topic	Item Response Theory IRT vocabulary translation dialects basic education
spellingShingle	Item Response Theory IRT vocabulary translation dialects basic education Weber, Ann M. Fernald, Lia C. H. Galasso, Emanuela Ratsifandrihamanana, Lisy Performance of a Receptive Language Test among Young Children in Madagascar
geographic_facet	Madagascar
description	Language tests developed and validated in one country may lose their desired properties when translated for use in another, possibly resulting in misleading estimates of ability. Using Item Response Theory (IRT) methodology, we assess the performance of a test of receptive vocabulary, the U.S.-validated Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Third Edition (PPVT-III), when translated, adapted, and administered to children 3 to 10 years of age in Madagascar (N = 1372), in the local language (Malagasy). Though Malagasy is considered a single language, there are numerous dialects spoken in Madagascar. Our findings were that test scores were positively correlated with age and indicators of socio-economic status. However, over half (57/96) of items evidenced unexpected response variation and/or bias by local dialect spoken. We also encountered measurement error and reduced differentiation among person abilities when we used the publishers’ recommended stopping rules, largely because we lost the original item ordering by difficulty when we translated test items into Malagasy. Our results suggest that bias and testing inefficiency introduced from the translation of the PPVT can be significantly reduced with the use of methods based on IRT at both the pre-testing and analysis stages. We explore and discuss implications for cross-cultural comparisons of internationally recognized tests, such as the PPVT.
format	Journal Article
author	Weber, Ann M. Fernald, Lia C. H. Galasso, Emanuela Ratsifandrihamanana, Lisy
author_facet	Weber, Ann M. Fernald, Lia C. H. Galasso, Emanuela Ratsifandrihamanana, Lisy
author_sort	Weber, Ann M.
title	Performance of a Receptive Language Test among Young Children in Madagascar
title_short	Performance of a Receptive Language Test among Young Children in Madagascar
title_full	Performance of a Receptive Language Test among Young Children in Madagascar
title_fullStr	Performance of a Receptive Language Test among Young Children in Madagascar
title_full_unstemmed	Performance of a Receptive Language Test among Young Children in Madagascar
title_sort	performance of a receptive language test among young children in madagascar
publisher	Public Library of Science
publishDate	2015
url	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/23193
_version_	1764453163812782080

Performance of a Receptive Language Test among Young Children in Madagascar

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