Test Validity in Cognitive Assessment

Scientific theories can be viewed as attempts to explain phenomena by showing how they would arise, if certain assumptions concerning the structure of the world were true. Such theories invariably involve a reference to theoretical entities and attributes. Theoretical attributes include such things as electrical charge and distance in physics, inclusive fitness and selective pressure in biology, brain activity and anatomic structure in neuroscience, and intelligence and developmental stages in psychology. These attributes are not subject to direct observation but require an inferential process by which the researcher infers positions of objects on the attribute on the basis of a set of observations.