Multidimensional Rasch Measurement on Intellectually Disabled Students’ Interpersonal Skills (Poster 43)

• In Event: AERA Poster Session Wednesday 2:30 p.m.
  In Poster Session: Measurement, Psychometrics, and Assessment: Poster Session II

Abstract

Social skill intervention is proved to be efficient in improving disabled students’ employment opportunities. However there lacks a validation of the instrument measuring students’ interpersonal skills. The study intends to measure whether the assessment of interpersonal skill for students with disability is capturing the psychometric characteristics of the attribute via Multidimensional Rasch model. By analyzing 47 intellectually disabled individuals’ performance on interpersonal skill, who participated a three-year college-based programs, the results showed that the Life-Centered-Education (LCE) curriculum has an acceptable fit to the model in which a good number of items endorse the participants’ interpersonal skills in two dimensions, developing interpersonal skills and communicating with others, with a few items showing “noisy” and “muted” response patterns.

Authors

• Huaiyue Zhang, University of Alabama

• Kagendo Mutua, University of Alabama

• Amy M. Williamson, University of Alabama