TESTING, CONCEPT OF TESTING AND TYPES OF TESTING

In our society psychological tests are used for varieties of purposes.

• They are used in public and private schools and for guidance and counseling student, for vocational guidance for adults seeking help in their carriers.
• Not only are tests used as an aid for selecting new employees for the organization, but also for promotion of employees and selection of best employees.

The term psychological test is commonly used because psychologists have done the most work in developing tests and their special province. Some various authors have defined tests different ways.

CROBBACH

LEE J. CRONBACH in his book “Essential of psychological testing”

Says “Testing is a systematic procedure for observing a person’s behavior and describing it with the aid of a numerical scale or a category system”

MILTON L. BLUM

In his book “industrial psychology and its social foundation”

“Test is a sample of an aspect of an individual’s behavior, performance or attitude”

HARRITE GORLIN

In his book “Personnel practice, recruitment, placement, training, communication and information”

“Test is a systematic procedure for sampling human behavior”

TESTING CONCEPTS

Following are the main testing concepts and methods that are essential to a sound understanding of how to use tests in a practical situation.

RELIABILITY

The reliability of a test is the consistency with which it yields the same source through a series of measurements. A considerable number of factors can cause a test to have low reliability of a test. If a test is not administrated under standardized conditions.

DETERMINATION OF RELIABLITY

There exist four different ways in which the reliability of a test can be determined. More precisely there are four types of test reliability.

These are;

• Equivalent form
• Test rest
• Split half and
• Odd even item split

The reliability CAE readily be determined by the test designer and is commonly reported in the manual.

VALIDITY

The validity of test is the degree to which it measures what is intended to measure. In an employment situation a valid test is one that accurately predicts the criterion is a measurement of how satisfactory and employee is on the job or is the total employment situation. Actually there are five distinct kinds of validity.

• Concurrent validity
• Predictive
• Content validity
• Construct validity

CONCURRENT VALIDITY

Concurrent validity refers to the degree to which test scores relate to the performance of employees presently on payroll.

PREDICTIVE VALIDITY

Predictive validity is determined by giving the test in question to all who apply for job.

CONTENT VALIDITY

Content validity is a concept employed by ht e psychologists to explain just what a particular test is measuring.

FACE VALIDITY
It is simple refers to whether the test
questions seem to relate to job.

validity

In summary then, the most important types of validity for personnel management purpose are concurrent, predictive and content.

COEFICIENT OF CORRELATION

Correlation is a statistic concept that indicates the degree of classiness of relationship between tow series of numbers. In selection testing, it is applied to both reliability and validity.

However, it should be noted that a high degree of and another does not necessary mean that the first measure relates closely to the second. It may be actually being that the first factor causes the second, or it may be that both some other common factor that has not been determined.