The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the university admissions and proficiency testing landscape. One change has been the meteoric rise in use of the fully automated Duolingo English Test (DET) for university entrance purposes, offering test-takers a cheaper, shorter, accessible alternative. This rapid response study is the first to investigate the…

The quality of sign language interpreting (SLI) is a gripping construct among practitioners, educators and researchers, calling for reliable and valid assessment. There has been a diverse array of methods in the extant literature to measure SLI quality, ranging from traditional error analysis to recent rubric scoring. In this study, we want to…

Nonverbal and other visual cues are well established as a critical component of human communication. Under most circumstances, visual information is available to aid in the comprehension and interpretation of spoken language. Citing these facts, many L2 assessment researchers have studied video-mediated listening tests through score comparisons…

This paper is an investigation into the use of the group oral discussion test (GOT) to detect changes in speaking proficiency over a two-year period. In this test, three or four test-takers discuss a topic for up to 10 minutes without outside intervention. The performance of 53 Japanese university English major students on this test was videoed…

Gaining insights from domain experts into how they view communication in real world settings is recognized as an important authenticity consideration in the development of criteria to assess language proficiency for specific academic or occupational purposes. These "indigenous" criteria represent an articulation of the test construct and…

The rise in the affordability of quality video production equipment has resulted in increased interest in video-mediated tests of foreign language listening comprehension. Although research on such tests has continued fairly steadily since the early 1980s, studies have relied on analyses of raw scores, despite the growing prevalence of item…

This paper reports an investigation into how the prompt may influence the discourse of group oral tests. The group oral test, in which three or four participants are rated on their ability to discuss a prompt, is a format for assessing the spoken ability of language learners. In this study, 141 Japanese university students were videoed in 41 group…

Oral fluency and foreign accent distinguish L2 from L1 speech production. In language testing practices, both fluency and accent are usually assessed by raters. This study investigates what exactly native raters of fluency and accent take into account when judging L2. Our aim is to explore the relationship between objectively measured temporal,…

This study explores the nature of co-constructed interaction in group oral tests by examining whether a test-taker's own and his or her group members' extraversion levels and oral proficiency levels have different influences on conversational styles between two group sizes: groups of three and groups of four. Data were collected from 269 Japanese…

This paper aims to present an overview of language testing in Thailand. Language testing practices in the past are also reviewed. Attention is paid to the washback effects of language tests, the use of language tests in school admissions, questions of test validity, the emergence of standardized tests, the influence of societal values on testing…