The purpose of this study was to compare calibration and linking methods for placing pretest item parameter estimates on the item pool scale in a 1-3 computerized multistage adaptive testing design in terms of item parameter recovery. Two models were used: embedded-section, in which pretest items were administered within a separate module, and embedded-items, in which pretest items were distributed across operational modules. The calibration methods were separate calibration with linking (SC) and fixed calibration (FC) with three parallel approaches under each (FC-1 and SC-1; FC-2 and SC-2; and FC-3 and SC-3). The FC-1 and SC-1 used only operational items in the routing module to link pretest items. The FC-2 and SC-2 also used only operational items in the routing module for linking, but in addition, the operational items in second stage modules were freely estimated. The FC-3 and SC-3 used operational items in all modules to link pretest items. The third calibration approach (i.e., FC-3 and SC-3) yielded the best results. For all three approaches, SC outperformed FC in all study conditions which were module length, sample size and examinee distributions.

中文翻译：

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计算机化多级自适应测试中的预测试项目校准

本研究的目的是在项目参数恢复方面，比较在 1-3 计算机化多阶段自适应测试设计中将预测试项目参数估计置于项目池规模上的校准和链接方法。使用了两种模型：嵌入部分（其中预测试项目在单独的模块中管理）和嵌入式项目（其中预测试项目分布在操作模块中）。校准方法是单独校准与链接（SC）和固定校准（FC），每个校准具有三种并行方法（FC-1和SC-1；FC-2和SC-2；FC-3和SC-3）。FC-1和SC-1仅使用路由模块中的操作项来链接预测试项。FC-2 和 SC-2 也仅使用路由模块中的操作项进行链接，但除此之外，第二阶段模块中的操作项目是自由估计的。FC-3和SC-3使用所有模块中的操作项来链接预测试项。第三种校准方法（即FC-3 和SC-3）产生了最好的结果。对于所有三种方法，SC 在所有研究条件（模块长度、样本大小和受试者分布）上均优于 FC。