Test, Measurement and Evaluation

The terms test, measurement, evaluation and assessment are occasionally used interchangeably, but most users make clear distinctions among them. This section sets out those distinctions, the way recognised authorities define each term, and how the three combine into a single cycle.

The three terms distinguished

• Test is usually the narrowest of the terms: it implies the tools, instruments or set of questions used to measure a dimension, quality or condition of a person, object or event. A test is an instrument or tool used to make a particular measurement, and the tool may be written, oral, mechanical or another variation.
• Measurement refers to the quantitative form of assessment - the scores obtained through a test. It is the act of assessing, which usually results in assigning a number to the character of whatever is assessed. Measurement is requisite for evaluation, supplying the data in the form of numbers or scores.
• Evaluation is a statement of quality, goodness, merit, value or worthiness about what has been assessed; it implies decision-making. More fully, it is "the process of delineating, obtaining, and providing useful information for judging decision alternatives." Measurement is therefore not the same as evaluation: two athletes may obtain the same measured score, yet be evaluated differently, because the criteria used to judge them - the norms and criterion measures available - may differ.

How the authorities define the terms

The textbook gathers several standard definitions worth knowing:

• A test is a tool to evaluate the skill, knowledge, capacities or aptitudes of an individual or a group. - Webster's Dictionary
• Test refers to any specific instrument, procedure or technique used by an administrator to elicit a response from the test-taker. - H. M. Barrow and Megee
• Test is the form of questioning or measuring used to assess retention of knowledge, capacity or ability of some endeavour. - Barry L. Johnson and Jack Nelson
• A test is an instrument or tool used to make a particular measurement ... Measurement refers to the process of administering a test to obtain quantitative data. - H. M. Barrow
• Measurement aids the evaluation process, in which various tools and techniques are used in the collection of data. - Barry L. Johnson and Jack Nelson
• An evaluation is an assessment, as systematic and impartial as possible, of an activity, project, programme, strategy, policy, topic, theme, sector, operational area or institutional performance. - United Nations Evaluation Group
• Evaluation is the process of education that involves collection of data from the products, which can be used for comparison with pre-conceived criteria to make judgement. - H. M. Barrow and Megee

The sequence - one assessment cycle

The three always occur in a fixed order and depend on one another:

A single sport example running through all three …