Entry Testing and the Overrepresentation of Romani ... - UR Research

R30PITFALLS AND BIASWhile the test claims to be relatively free of cultural bias, non-dominant cultural communities, such as illiterateCongolese mine workers, who traditionally do not do well on the Progressive Matrices improve their performancewith repeated administrations, that is, as their familiarity with the testing conditions/procedures grow(Ombrédane, Robaye, and Plumail 1956 as cited in Brouwers et al. 2009, 331). Nonverbal tests in fact do requirelanguage – the instructions for the test, the conceptual skills that can be learned only through proficiency in alanguage – and language is related to culture (Oller 1997, 488; Gunderson and Siegel 2001, 51).Two studies examined how testing conditions and training impact children’s scores on the CPM. Klauer and Willmes(2002) conducted a study in which one group of first-grade children were specifically taught inductive reasoningstrategies while the other group engaged in regular classroom activities. The group of children who were taughtinductive reasoning strategies performed better on the CPM than those children who did not have specific strategyinstruction. Désert, Préaux, and Jund (2009, 210) presented instructions for the assessment in two differentways: (1) as required by the manual: “We are going to do a series of exercises together in order to evaluate thedomains you succeed in and those where you fail, to know your strengths and weaknesses. Do you best so we canknow your strengths and your weaknesses,” and (2) in a non-evaluative way: “We are going to do a series of gamestogether because we created new games, and we want to know if they are well adapted to children of yourage. Do you best so that we can know if the games are suitable for children of your age.” These evaluative and nonevaluativeinstructions were given to French pupils from low and high socio-economic strata in test administrationtrials. The non-evaluative “game” instructions did not affect the performance of pupils with high socio-economicstatus (SES), but this test condition brought improved results of pupils from low-SES households, who mighthave been more keenly aware of lowered expectations associated with their families and backgrounds, thusimpacting their performance when told that a measure was a test of their own abilities, as opposed to testingthe measure’s appropriateness for children their age. Thus, method matters in assessing intelligence, and noinstrument that measures a construct can be completely free from cultural bias.SUMMARYAn assessment of intelligence is valid only insofar as it has been normed with all representative populationsof a country or region and appropriately measures what it is supposed to measure. An assessment can be used todetermine a child’s areas of strengths and weaknesses for instructional planning purposes. However, it is theinappropriate and biased ways in which these instruments are used that lead to segregation and denial of equalityof educational opportunity for Romani children. Factors leading to misinterpretation of test results include theuse of translations of tests, under-representation of certain ethnic or language groups when the test is standardized,and the failure to create a comfortable and engaging testing environment. Misdiagnosis can occur as a resultof imprecise reporting of results, not following test administration protocol, or administering the test in culturallyor linguistically inappropriate ways. Finally, practitioner malpractice may occur as a result of blatant bias or