MEASURING STUDENTS’ ATYPICAL PATTERNS OF RESPONSE TO ASSESSMENT BY VALIDATING THEIR MOTIVATIONS

Unexpected answers to multiple-choice questions, such as correctly answering difficult questions and instead answering easy questions incorrectly, configure what are known as atypical response patterns (ARPs). ARPs identification is necessary to analyze the validity of individual scores. In the present study carried out in collaboration with the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (UAB), the response patterns of 136 students from three different degrees taught at FAREM-Carazo of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Nicaragua (UNAN-Managua) were evaluated by using the same multiple choice test over the students. The test contained fifteen questions with four options of answer about the same subject of "Geography and History". Once the tests were corrected, response patterns considered atypical were identified. To inquire into the motives of such patterns, the students were interviewed to ask, among other things, about the strategies to prepare the test, whether any questions were answered at random or if they copy any answer from their peers. The analysis correlates the motivations and explanations given by the students to the different typology of PAR.