--- abstract: "The pass rate of a test item often serves as an index of its difficulty. This posterior index, though easy to obtain and definite, is susceptible to students' learning level. It cannot play a leading role in designing test items. The present research tried to design a prior-to-test index of test item difficulty. According to the principles of cognitive task analysis, a frame and a procedure to be\r\nstrictly executed were mapped out for the prior assessment of higher mathematics test items. Taking into account the characteristics of math problems, we designed such indexes as number of elements in a problem, element identification difficulty, number of principles used in answering, principle identification difficulty and cognitive load. The results show that prior difficulty is most significantly\r\ncorrelated with the pass rates of math test items. High correlation also exists among sub-indexes in assessment and among evaluators, indicating sufficient validity and reliability of the prior assessment method developed by the present reseach." altloc: [] chapter: ~ commentary: ~ commref: ~ confdates: ~ conference: ~ confloc: ~ contact_email: ~ creators_id: - zfshao@psy.ecnu.edu.cn - ~ creators_name: - family: Shao given: Z. F. honourific: '' lineage: '' - family: Yu given: L. honourific: '' lineage: '' date: 2008-05-01 date_type: published datestamp: 2007-08-15 department: ~ dir: disk0/00/00/56/66 edit_lock_since: ~ edit_lock_until: ~ edit_lock_user: ~ editors_id: [] editors_name: [] eprint_status: archive eprintid: 5666 fileinfo: /style/images/fileicons/application_pdf.png;/5666/1/2008%E8%AF%95%E9%A2%98%E9%9A%BE%E5%BA%A6%E7%9A%84%E4%BA%8B%E5%89%8D%E8%AE%A4%E7%9F%A5%E4%BB%BB%E5%8A%A1%E5%88%86%E6%9E%90.pdf full_text_status: public importid: ~ institution: ~ isbn: ~ ispublished: pub issn: ~ item_issues_comment: [] item_issues_count: 0 item_issues_description: [] item_issues_id: [] item_issues_reported_by: [] item_issues_resolved_by: [] item_issues_status: [] item_issues_timestamp: [] item_issues_type: [] keywords: 'test item difficulty, cognitive task analysis, prior diffculty' lastmod: 2011-03-11 08:56:57 latitude: ~ longitude: ~ metadata_visibility: show note: ~ number: 3 pagerange: 696-698 pubdom: TRUE publication: Psychological Science publisher: ~ refereed: TRUE referencetext: ~ relation_type: [] relation_uri: [] reportno: ~ rev_number: 18 series: ~ source: ~ status_changed: 2008-07-31 08:52:00 subjects: - appl-cog-psy succeeds: ~ suggestions: ~ sword_depositor: ~ sword_slug: ~ thesistype: ~ title: Prior Cognitive Task Analysis of Test Item Difficulty type: journalp userid: 542 volume: 31