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The MIMIC Method With Scale Purification for Detecting Differential Item FunctioningHong Kong Institute of Education, wcwang{at}ied.edu.hk
National Taichung University
National Taichung University This study implements a scale purification procedure onto the standard MIMIC method for differential item functioning (DIF) detection and assesses its performance through a series of simulations. It is found that the MIMIC method with scale purification (denoted as M-SP) outperforms the standard MIMIC method (denoted as M-ST) in controlling false-positive rates and yielding higher true-positive rates. Only when the DIF pattern is balanced between groups or when there is a small percentage of DIF items in the test does M-ST perform as appropriately as M-SP. Moreover, both methods yield a higher true-positive rate under the two-parameter logistic model than under the three-parameter model. M-SP is preferable to M-ST, because DIF patterns in real tests are unlikely to be perfectly balanced and the percentages of DIF items may not be small.
Key Words: differential item functioning scale purification item response theory confirmatory factor analysis MIMIC
This version was published on October
1, 2009 Educational and Psychological Measurement, Vol. 69, No. 5,
713-731 (2009) |
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