Abstract:
This paper is broadly concerned with
problems associated with the use of test
score data to infer the relative strength of
inputs to the production of learning. It
should be of interest to those employing a
typical strategy of economic education research:
pretesting students, applying some
special educational treatment to a subset
of students, and posttesting the students.
By this strategy the researcher enquires
whether the treated group learned more or
learned more efficiently. This paper specifically
addresses several concerns raised by
Thomas Johnson by laying out a set of
structural equations and thereby modelling
the probability of answering a test item correctly
and by dealing in a novel way with
the hypothesis that some test questions are
more difficult than others.
