Effect of early misfit in computerized adaptive testing on the rcovery of theta. Unpublished doctoral dissertation,

Abstract This study focused on how early misfit affected the recovery of θ for a computerized adaptive test (CAT). Number of misfitting items, generating θ, item selection method, and θ estimation method were independent variables in a monte-carlo simulation. It was found that CAT could recover from misfit-ascorrect-responses for low ability simulees given a sufficient number of items. CAT could not recover from misfit-as-incorrect-responses for high ability simulees. Implications of the study and suggestions for future research are provided