How do undergraduates perceive the use of assessment? A study in higher education

ABSTRACT

Drawing upon a wider piece of research, this paper focuses on the validation of a ‘use of assessment’ scale in five Portuguese public universities with 5549 students. The study aims to investigate the psychometric properties of the scale, to describe how students look at assessment uses, to analyse their utility perceptions of assessment, and to understand their perspectives regarding participation in the assessment process. The scale demonstrated adequate validity and reliability based on factor analysis of the internal structure. Preference for alternative methods of assessment was negatively correlated with a preference for traditional methods of assessment. However, preference for alternative methods was correlated with higher scores for assessment effectiveness, fairness and level of participation and engagement with assessment. On the contrary, preference for traditional methods was negatively correlated with perceived fairness and with engagement with assessment.

KEYWORDS:

• Assessment
• higher education
• use of assessment

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The project reported in this paper was funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (Government Funding Agency) (PTDC/MHCCED/2703/2014) and co-financed by European Regional Development Funds (FEDER), Competitiveness and Internationalization Operational Program (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-007562).

Notes on contributors

Diana Pereira

Diana Pereira holds a Ph.D. in Educational Sciences – Curricular Development from the University of Minho/European Ph.D. (Malardalen University, Sweden). She has published her work in international journals with impact factors and is a member of national and international projects, mainly in the area of Educational Sciences. Her research interests include assessment, learning and teaching process, feedback, curriculum development, educational leadership, educational policies and higher education.

Irene Cadime

Irene Cadime holds a master’s in Psychological Intervention, Education and Human Development from the University of Porto and a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Minho. She is currently a researcher and an integrated member of the Research Centre on Child Studies at the Education Institute of the University of Minho. She develops research in the fields of psychometry, language development and academic success.

Gavin Brown

Gavin Brown, University of Auckland, New Zealand, is an international expert in the field of educational assessment. He is a leading scholar in educational assessment resulting in practice and policy changes at institutional and national levels. He has also demonstrated achievement in developing excellence in quantitative data analysis and effective researcher training. He has published extensively on the topic of assessment.

Maria Assunção Flores

Maria Assunção Flores works at the University of Minho, Portugal. She received her Ph.D. at the University of Nottingham, UK. Her research interests include teacher professionalism and identity, teacher education and professional development, teacher appraisal, curriculum, assessment and higher education. She has published extensively on these topics both nationally and internationally. She served as Chair of the International Study Association on Teachers and Teaching (ISATT) between 2013 and 2019.