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Review
. 2024 May 1;129(3):191-198.
doi: 10.1352/1944-7558-129.3.191.

Measurement Invariance in Intellectual and Developmental Disability Research

Cristan Farmer  1 , Aaron J Kaat  2 , Michael C Edwards  3 , Luc Lecavalier  4
Affiliations
Review

Measurement Invariance in Intellectual and Developmental Disability Research

Cristan Farmer et al. Am J Intellect Dev Disabil. .

Abstract

Measurement invariance (MI) is a psychometric property of an instrument indicating the degree to which scores from an instrument are comparable across groups. In recent years, there has been a marked uptick in publications using MI in intellectual and developmental disability (IDD) samples. Our goal here is to provide an overview of why MI is important to IDD researchers and to describe some challenges to evaluating it, with an eye towards nudging our subfield into a more thoughtful and measured interpretation of studies using MI.

Keywords: differential item functioning; factor analysis; item response theory; measurement invariance; psychometrics; structural equation modeling; validity theory.

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Figures

Figure. 1
Figure. 1. IDD Measurement Invariance Publications.
A September 2023 Scopus all-time literature review searching key terms, titles, and abstracts for words related to measurement invariance and IDD (search specifications available upon request) yielded 156 results. After excluding duplicates and studies not related to IDD or measurement invariance, 123 papers from 48 journals remained. No publications were found prior to 2006.
Figure. 2
Figure. 2. Potential courses of action when items on a measure exhibit noninvariance.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

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