A Comparative Study On The Measuring Capacity Of Three Reading Item Types

Language learning is usually divided into four skills,consisting of listening,speaking,reading and writing.Reading is the most direct and effective way to acquire language knowledge and cultivate language ability.Especially for learning a foreign language,because the domestic hearing and speaking environment are poor,reading is the main source of obtaining information.Therefore,reading ability becomes a very important criterion to measure a person's language competence.Reading comprehension has a large proportion in a variety of language tests.However,most of the domestic reading tests employ a single item type of reading comprehension which is multiple choice question.And the research and use of other item types of reading comprehension are relatively limited.Therefore,it is difficult for many reading comprehension test workers to choose the appropriate item type of reading comprehension scientifically to obtain more accurate and effective test results.This study compared the general capacities of three item types of reading comprehension—MCQ,SSQ,and SAQ respectively.The author employed the statistical method of language testing proposed by Grant Henning in his book A guide to language testing:development,evaluation and research to measure the factors such as difficulty,discriminability,reliability and validity,which determine measuring capacity of reading comprehension test.The study of construct validity is based on Lyle Bachman's division of reading ability,and using McDonough's theory of introspection to get the results.The paper focuses on the three questions:1.Are subjects' performances different w-hen different reading item types are utilized?2.Are there any variances in difficulty,discriminability,validity,and reliability of the three different reading item types?3.Which kind of reading item types can yield a better effective and reliable measurement of subjects' overall reading competence?In order to answer the above three questions,the author has done a comparative study on the measuring capacities of MCQ,SSQ and SAQ.The subjects are 60 third-grade undergraduates from non-English majors at Southwest Jiaotong University.The subjects were requested to complete three sets of reading comprehension test with identical reading material and different item types in three different time periods.The test scores were input to computer,and the data were analyzed by SPSS 19.0,a statistical software of sociology.Subsequently,the author did a questionnaire survey among the 60 subjects to obtain the surface validity data of each item type.Finally,the subjects were asked to complete oral self-reports based on their memories of the answering process.The author recorded these reports to obtain the construct validity data.After analyzing and comparing the data,the author draws the following conclusions:First,the reading comprehension scores of the three item types are significantly different.And the MCQ is the easiest type,while SAQ is the most difficult type.Second,based on the comparison and analysis of the reliability,validity,discriminability and difficulty of the three item types of reading comprehension,the author draws the following conclusions:SAQ and SSQ both have a good discriminating ability and satisfactory reliability and validity.However,some subjects expressed they had experienced anxiety because SAQ was too difficult for them.However,the data of the most widely used item type MCQ on these measuring factors is not very good.Third,based on the study of data,the author draws the conclusion that SAQ can effectively test the general reading ability of the subjects,comparing with the other two types of reading comprehension test.Based on the above conclusions,the author suggests that reading comprehension test designers should select appropriate item type according to different testing purposes.And MCQ is not suitable for large-scale proficiency test or selective test as the only item type in reading comprehension test.In other words,it should be combined with other item types with good measuring capacities such as SAQ.Due to the limitation of experimental conditions and time,the study employed a small number of samples,and the washback effect of different item types of reading comprehension is not involved.And the author only confined one variate to research which is the item type.These are the parts need to be improved in the future research.