When Should Individual Ability Estimates Be Reported if Rapid Guessing Is Present?

Testing programs are confronted with the decision of whether to report individual scores for examinees that have engaged in rapid guessing (RG). As noted by Standards Educational and Psychological Testing, this should be based on a documented criterion determines score exclusion. To end, number heuristic criteria (e.g., exclude all RG rates 10%) been adopted literature. Given these lack strong methodological support, objective simulation study was evaluate their appropriateness terms ability estimate classification accuracy when manipulating both assessment characteristics. The findings provide evidence employing common may an ineffective strategy because given percentage differing degrees biasing effects test difficulty, examinee ability, pattern. These results suggest practitioners benefit from establishing context-specific exclusion consider purpose, use, targeted trait levels.