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ERIC Number: EJ981247
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2012-Feb
Pages: 5
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0021-9584
EISSN: N/A
Investigating Factors that Influence Item Performance on ACS Exams
Schroeder, Jacob; Murphy, Kristen L.; Holme, Thomas A.
Journal of Chemical Education, v89 n3 p346-350 Feb 2012
General chemistry tests from the Examinations Institute of the Division of Chemical Education of the American Chemical Society have been analyzed to identify factors that may influence how individual test items perform. In this paper, issues of item order (position within a set of items that comprise a test) and answer order (position of correct answer relative to incorrect distractors) are discussed. Answer order is identified as potentially important, particularly for conceptually based items. When the correct answer appears earlier among the answer choices, there is some greater propensity for student performance to be better. Item-order effects are also possible, particularly when students encounter several challenging items consecutively. Performance on the next item may be lower than expected, possibly because of cognitive-load effects. (Contains 4 tables.)
Division of Chemical Education, Inc and ACS Publications Division of the American Chemical Society. 1155 Sixteenth Street NW, Washington, DC 20036. Tel: 800-227-5558; Tel: 202-872-4600; e-mail: eic@jce.acs.org; Web site: http://pubs.acs.org/jchemeduc
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: Higher Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A