A computer-based test item bank using a Rasch model
A computer-based test item bank using a Rasch model

Summary/Abstract: This chapter describes a computer-based test item bank which I am developing for use in the English Language Centre of the University of Poznań. The system depends on a statistical analysis using a Rasch model, or Latent Trait theory. This is a recent and still relatively little-known approach to statistical analysis, and this paper will thus include an introduction to the probabilistic principles upon which it is based, and a brief discussion of the advantages claimed for it. Various computer programmes have been described for fitting the Rasch model to data. The item bank described uses a computerised version of a procedure for hand-working called PROX. Readers interested in actually using the statistics would need more guidance than the limited space here allows (e.g. Henning 1987). Therefore only the background to the statistics is described in this chapter.

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