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Extending The Model With Internal Restrictions On Item Difficulty (Mirid) To Study Differential Item Functioning, Yong "Isaac" Li

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Differential item functioning (DIF) is a psychometric issue routinely considered in educational and psychological assessment. However, it has not been studied in the context of a recently developed componential statistical model, the model with internal restrictions on item difficulty (MIRID; Butter, De Boeck, & Verhelst, 1998). Because the MIRID requires test questions measuring either single or multiple cognitive processes, it creates a complex environment for which traditional DIF methods may be inappropriate. This dissertation sought to extend the MIRID framework to detect DIF at the item-group level and the individual-item level. Such a model-based approach can increase the interpretability of …