Accepted author manuscript, 598 KB, PDF document
Available under license: CC BY-NC: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Final published version, 471 KB, PDF document
Available under license: CC BY-NC: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Final published version
Licence: CC BY-NC: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
}
TY - JOUR
T1 - Investigating the construct measured by banked gap-fill items
T2 - evidence from eye-tracking
AU - McCray, Gareth
AU - Brunfaut, Tineke
PY - 2018/1/1
Y1 - 2018/1/1
N2 - This study investigates test-takers’ processing while completing banked gap-fill tasks, designed to test reading proficiency, in order to test theoretically based expectations about the variation in cognitive processes of test-takers across levels of performance. Twenty-eight test-takers’ eye traces on 24 banked gap-fill items (on six tasks) were analysed according to seven on-line eye-tracking measures representing overall, text and task processing. Variation in processing was related to test-takers’ level of performance on the tasks overall. In particular, as hypothesised, lower-scoring students exerted more cognitive effort on local reading and lower-level cognitive processing in contrast to test-takers who attained higher scores. The findings of different cognitive processes associated with variation in scores illuminate the construct measured by banked gap-fill items, and therefore have implications for test design and the validity of score interpretations.
AB - This study investigates test-takers’ processing while completing banked gap-fill tasks, designed to test reading proficiency, in order to test theoretically based expectations about the variation in cognitive processes of test-takers across levels of performance. Twenty-eight test-takers’ eye traces on 24 banked gap-fill items (on six tasks) were analysed according to seven on-line eye-tracking measures representing overall, text and task processing. Variation in processing was related to test-takers’ level of performance on the tasks overall. In particular, as hypothesised, lower-scoring students exerted more cognitive effort on local reading and lower-level cognitive processing in contrast to test-takers who attained higher scores. The findings of different cognitive processes associated with variation in scores illuminate the construct measured by banked gap-fill items, and therefore have implications for test design and the validity of score interpretations.
KW - testing reading
KW - eye tracking
KW - banked gap-fill
KW - cloze
KW - cognitive processing
U2 - 10.1177/0265532216677105
DO - 10.1177/0265532216677105
M3 - Journal article
VL - 35
SP - 51
EP - 73
JO - Language Testing
JF - Language Testing
SN - 0265-5322
IS - 1
ER -