Psychometrics

Psychometrics is a branch of scientific psychology that is concerned with the theory and technique of psychological and educational assessment and measurement and the construction of instruments that are developed to appraise psychological and educational constructs (e.g., multidimensional achievement batteries, intelligence tests, and behavior rating scales). As a result, psychometric techniques are routinely employed throughout the corpus of quantitative educational research.

Historical Development

Although the genesis of these methods has been debated extensively within the technical literature, Sir Francis Galton (1822–1911) has been called the “father of psychometrics” and is credited by many as the first to apply early versions of these techniques when attempting to measure individual differences during the Victorian era. As a result of these experiments, Galton developed the correlation coefficient, which later served ...

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