TY - JOUR
T1 - Output register parallelism in an identical direct and semi-direct speaking test
T2 - A case study
AU - Quaid, Ethan Douglas
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
Copyright © 2018, IGI Global.
PY - 2018/4/1
Y1 - 2018/4/1
N2 - The present trend in developing and using semi-direct speaking tests has been supported by test developers and researchers' claim of their increased practicality, higher reliability and concurrent validity with test scores in direct oral proficiency interviews. However, it is universally agreed within the language testing and assessment community that interchangeability must be investigated from multiple perspectives. This study compared test taker output from a computer-based Aptis General speaking test and a purposively developed identical face-to-face direct oral proficiency interview using a counterbalanced research design. Within subject analyses of salient output features identified in prior related research were completed. Results showed that test taker output in the computer-based test was less contextualised, with minimally higher lexical density and syntactic complexity. Given these findings, the indicated slight register shift in output may be viewed as non-consequential, or even as advantageous, for semi-direct speaking tests.
AB - The present trend in developing and using semi-direct speaking tests has been supported by test developers and researchers' claim of their increased practicality, higher reliability and concurrent validity with test scores in direct oral proficiency interviews. However, it is universally agreed within the language testing and assessment community that interchangeability must be investigated from multiple perspectives. This study compared test taker output from a computer-based Aptis General speaking test and a purposively developed identical face-to-face direct oral proficiency interview using a counterbalanced research design. Within subject analyses of salient output features identified in prior related research were completed. Results showed that test taker output in the computer-based test was less contextualised, with minimally higher lexical density and syntactic complexity. Given these findings, the indicated slight register shift in output may be viewed as non-consequential, or even as advantageous, for semi-direct speaking tests.
KW - Computer-Based
KW - Direct Oral Proficiency Interview
KW - Register
KW - Speaking Test
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85050779216&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.4018/IJCALLT.2018040105
DO - 10.4018/IJCALLT.2018040105
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85050779216
SN - 2155-7098
VL - 8
SP - 75
EP - 91
JO - International Journal of Computer-Assisted Language Learning and Teaching
JF - International Journal of Computer-Assisted Language Learning and Teaching
IS - 2
ER -