Sociocultural Differences in Examinees' Attitudes Toward Scholastic Ability Exams

The major aim of the present study was threefold: (a) to compare the test attitudes and perceptions o f examinees of varying sociocultural group membership toward verbal and nonverbal standardized ability tests; (b) to determine the degree of covariation between test attitudes and test scores; and (c) to delineate the properties and potential applications of a test attitude or feedback inventory specifically designed to assess examinees’ perceptions of key situational variables in the test context. The feedback inventory was administered to a sample of 259 seventh grade students in Israel immediately following standardized group scholastic ability testing procedures. On the whole, few meaningful group differences in test attitudes were observed by social class, ethnicity, or sex. However, a nonverbal test was generally rated more favorably than a verbal test, among varying sociocultural and sex subgroups. Considered together, test attitude scales share a meaningful proportion o f variance with the test score on both verbal and nonverbal tests. However, in view o f the negligible ethnic and social class differences in test attitudes and the nonsignificant interaction between test attitudes and background variables, the data provide little support for the situational bias claim