A Factor Mixture Model for Item Responses and Certainty of Response Indices to Identify Student Knowledge Profiles

Chia Wen Chen, Björn Andersson*, Jinxin Zhu

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articlepeer-review

    Abstract

    The certainty of response index (CRI) measures respondents' confidence level when answering an item. In conjunction with the answers to the items, previous studies have used descriptive statistics and arbitrary thresholds to identify student knowledge profiles with the CRIs. Whereas this approach overlooked the measurement error of the observed item responses and indices, we address this by proposing a factor mixture model that integrates a latent class model to detect student subgroups and a measurement model to control for student ability and confidence level. Applying the model to 773 seventh graders' responses to an algebra test, where some items were related to new material that had not been taught in class, we found two subgroups: (1) students who had high confidence in answering items involving the new material; and (2) students who had low confidence in answering items involving the new material but higher general self-confidence than the first group. We regressed the posterior probability of the group membership on gender, prior achievement, and preview behavior and found preview behavior a significant factor associated with the membership. Finally, we discussed the implications of the current study for teaching practices and future research.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)28-51
    Number of pages24
    JournalJournal of Educational Measurement
    Volume60
    Issue number1
    Early online date10 Oct 2022
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 1 Mar 2023

    Scopus Subject Areas

    • Education
    • Developmental and Educational Psychology
    • Applied Psychology
    • Psychology (miscellaneous)

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