Proctor

A friend of mine brought up an interesting idea, that more recently resurfaced while I was looking through my piles of literature. They said that they believe tests are a form of violence. In taking tests, and seeing their effects on people, I'd only considered how unfortunate it is that they must be this way, but I never considered who decided it was ethical to conduct them at all. Thinking of tests in terms of violence, is not that much of a stretch, and it turns out there have been many investigations into the nature of tests. Critics ask do they do more harm than is worth it, how effective are they, who gets to decide what the right answer is.

The questions include whether tests probe improperly into a person's private feelings and beliefs, whether they are based in discriminatory practices against minorities (deliberate or accidental) or are based in non-representative samples.

Some critics regard tests, especially personality measures as 'unethical invasions of privacy', which are dependent on 'coercion and deceit'. Studies of interests and personalities need to be written in such a manner to avoid the halo effect, to prevent some of the tendencies in people responding to questions to provide answers that seem most socially desirable. This means that the way in which the answers will be interpreted has to be hidden from the person responding, so the question would be worded in a way that seems obscure or unrelated. There is an overt conflict in this situation, you are relying on the wisdom and ethics of the person performing the test. Well meaning, but untrained people are just as much of a risk to the wellbeing of respondents.

All tests can serve multiple purposes, evaluation, qualification and learning diagnostics, but there are issues in who you are testing, and what purposes are emphasized. There are tests throughout many aspects of our lives, tests of skills and problem solving, like driver's license, potential for higher learning like admission into graduate schools, evaluation of mental or physical wellbeing, and tests of less gravity, meant as entertainment, like those you see on the internet or in newspapers. It is important to designate for the responder the nature of the test, and how it will be applied, because if tests taken for entertainment purposes are relied upon as valid sources of information, they can be highly misleading and are not evaluated according to any accepted standards.

The "standards" however are highly debatable, as outlined in the above, there is much to ask about what answers, and what interpretations are correct. In direct standardized testing it is usually defined as:

1) systematic procedures to observe human behavior
2) describe it in terms of a numerical scale or category system with
3) fixed administration, apparatus and scoring methods so that the same procedures can be reproduced exactly each time they are used

We like to see standardized testing as reliable, easy to evaluate, and readily interpret validly.

"we must not expect absolute precision, even from standardized tests, any more than we would expect it from a bathroom scale used, for example, to measure the weight of precious gems." -Richard E. Snow

The idea of fixed administration is likely part of the failure in tests to be fair, and worthwhile. There are several types of standardized testing, aside from personality and interest inventories, there are special ability, aptitude and achievement tests. Each with their own defined goal and methods.

Aptitude tests measure potential ability, or ability with proper training. This is predicting how well a student will do in advanced schooling.
Achievement measures how much of some skill or knowledge a student has already acquired.
The idea of fluid ability vs. crystallized ability is dependent on the concept that "when no basic changes in teaching or training methods are expected, achievement- past performance in the same subject-may best predict future success," this means that there is little designation between potential and past success. So people who have performed poorly for whatever reason, are subjected to further disadvantage, when it is assumed that they cannot do any differently than their past performance on a highly fallible evaluation.

Some tests contain culturally biased items, because of efforts to make questions more difficult, obscure words, uncommon objects, and other irrelevant difficulties have found their way into commonly used tests. Such items do discriminate against those from impoverished or ethnically different backgrounds. A failure in a person from an impoverished background to relate to questions with crystal chandeliers is not incomprehensible. So how can we claim to have a standard evaluation when these types of things are prevalent?


This is important as we attempt to be both increasingly productive, and sensitive to human feelings and value, while using tools of placement and identification. It is pretty widely accepted that tests that are applied without informed consent of the person tested is an invasion of privacy, but it is common that tests use answers to vague or misleading questions to satisfy guidelines of a certain category or character in identifying a person within a group. Looking at how tests can be used to discriminate, looking at how damaging they can be if used as absolutes, I see it would be perfectly reasonable that the way we go about testing be reconsidered, and then undone completely.

"The consensus seems to be that we are better off with them than without them- as long as we continue to pursue safeguards for the present and improvements for the future."

I say no. That is not good enough. There are too many negatives in testing to address properly here. The literature I was reading is from 1973, and the basis for their prolonging this idea was that we would maintain control of interpretation and bias. We have not adequately done so.

Looking at these few above aspects, and comparing my thoughts to the conclusion of the critic I was focusing on, Mr. Snow, I agree that testing is a form of violence, and because of this I divorce any sense of it as a necessity. Testing in such way stifles growth, narrows value of creativity, and limits and demeans the value in the differences between people. If you can quantify the value of somebody's thoughts, which I am not sure you can, testing is most certainly not the way to go, and serious measures should be taken to reduce its effects on the daily lives of students, job applicants and anyone else affected.