Creating IRT-Based Parallel Test Forms Using the Genetic Algorithm Method

In educational measurement, the construction of parallel test forms is often a combinatorial optimization problem that involves the time-consuming selection of items to construct tests having approximately the same test information functions (TIFs) and constraints. This article proposes a novel meth...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Applied measurement in education 2008-04, Vol.21 (2), p.141-161
Main Authors: Sun, Koun-Tem, Chen, Yu-Jen, Tsai, Shu-Yen, Cheng, Chien-Fen
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Comparative analysis
Education
Educational Research
Equations (Mathematics)
Error of Measurement
Evaluation Methods
Genetic algorithms
Item Response Theory
Measurement
Measurement Techniques
Optimization algorithms
Test Construction
Test Format
Test Items
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Summary:In educational measurement, the construction of parallel test forms is often a combinatorial optimization problem that involves the time-consuming selection of items to construct tests having approximately the same test information functions (TIFs) and constraints. This article proposes a novel method, genetic algorithm (GA), to construct parallel test forms effectively. The sum of squared errors of the generated TIFs produced by GA were compared with those of the Swanson and Stocking method, and the Wang and Ackerman method. Experimental results show that tests constructed using GA yielded lower error, and an average improvement ratio above 90%.
ISSN:0895-7347
1532-4818
DOI:10.1080/08957340801926151