Reliability and Validity Flashcards
Reliability
- refers to the replicable nature of research studies/tools
- high reliability does not guarantee scientific validity
Testing reliability
- test-retest correlation
- instrument is twice administered to the same population
- 2-14 days in between
Cronbach’s alpha
- measures internal consistency of a test by correlating each item with the total score and averaging the correlation coefficients
- it takes values between negative intinity and 1 as maximum but only positive values make sense
- arbitrary cut-off of 0.70 is used to call the evaluated test to be internally consisten
Split-half reliability
-refers to splitting a scale into two parts and examining the correlation
Interrater reliability
-measured using two or more raters rating the same population using the same scale
Intraclass correlation coefficient
- used for continuous variables
- the proportion of total variance of the measurement that reflects true between subject variability
- ranges between 0 (unreliable) and 1 (perfect reliability)
- relative ICC is always higher than absolute ICC
ANOVA intraclass coefficient
-used for quantitative data of more than 2 raters/groups
Nominal data reliability
-if it has more than two categories then a kappa or weighted kappa can be used
Validity of an instrument
-the extent to which an instrument measures what it proposes to measure
Face validity
-refers to a subjective measure of deciding whether the test measures the construct of interest on its face value (what it was designed for)
Construct validity
-measures whether a test really measures the theoretical construct of interest of something else
Content validity
-refers to whether the contents ie each individual subscales, items or elements of the test are in line with the general objectives or specifications the test was originally designed to measure
Criterion validity
-refers to performance against an external criterion such as another instrument (concurrent) or future diagnostic possibility (predictive)
Concurrent validity
-refers to the ability of a test to distinguish between subjects who differ concurrently in other measures e.g those who score high on a scale of insomnia may score high on the scale of fatigue ratings
Predictive validity
-the ability of a test to predict future group differences according to current group differences in score
Incremental validity
-refers to the ability of a measure to predict or explain variance over and above other measures