Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-cphqk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-08T07:08:16.253Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Statistical Problems in the Evaluation of Army Tests

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2025

Cyril Burt
Cyril Burt*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University College, London
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The introduction of psychological tests for personnel selection in the British forces has given rise to several novel problems in statistical procedure. The solutions proposed are in the main extensions of devices already familiar in educational psychology. The more important are: (i) where the criterion yields a threefold classification only, a method of triserial correlation or of biserial correlation assuming point-distributions for the extremes; (ii) where the data on which validation has to be based are drawn from a selected sample, a simplified form of Pearson's equations to correct for selection; (iii) where the best line of demarcation has to be deduced from theoretical rather than practical considerations, a formula based on the principle of minimal discrepancy.

Type
Original Paper
Information
Psychometrika , Volume 9 , Issue 4 , December 1944 , pp. 219 - 235
Copyright
Copyright © 1944 The Psychometric Society

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

In what follows, to save continual circumlocution, I shall use the word “test” to cover scores based on any empirical method of assessment, e.g., gradings derived from observations, interviews, questionnaires, rating-scales, reports, etc., as well as the results of formal testing or examination.

References

Pearson, K. On the influence of natural selection on the correlation and variability of organs. Phil. Trans. Roy. Soc. (A), 1902, 200, 1–66.Google Scholar
Pearson, K. Tables for statisticians and biometricians, Pts. I and II, London: Biometric Laboratory, University College, 1914.Google Scholar
Burt, C. The distribution and relations of educational abilities, London: P. S. King, 1917.Google Scholar
Burt, C. Mental and scholastic tests, London: P. S. King, 1921.Google Scholar
Kelley, T. L. Statistical method, New York: Macmillan Co., 1923.Google Scholar
Burt, C. Principles of vocational guidance. Brit. J. Psychol., 1924, 14, 336–352.Google Scholar
-- Memoranda on psychological testing in the Army. 1941–4 (circulated privately).Google Scholar
Burt, C. Psychology in war. Reprinted (abridged) in Occupational Psychology, 1942, 16, 95–111.Google Scholar
Burt, C. The use of statistics in vocational psychology. Occupational Psychology, 1942, 16, 164–174.Google Scholar
-- Military psychology in Great Britain. (Presidential Address, British Psychological Society, 1943.)Google Scholar
Guilford, J. P. The phi-coefficient and chi square as indices of item validity. Psychometrika, 1941, 6, 18–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burt, C. Validating tests for personnel selection. Brit. J. Psychol., 1943, 34, 1–19.Google Scholar