A Rationale for the
Design of the Psychometric Entrance Test
Yigal Attali & Chanan Goldschmidt
National Institute for Testing and Evaluation (NITE)
Preface
The
Psychometric Entrance Test (PET) is produced by the National Institute for
Testing and Evaluation (NITE) and used in the selection of candidates for
higher education in
PET
is composed of three subtests: Verbal Reasoning, Quantitative Reasoning, and
English. The Verbal Reasoning subtest includes questions in the domain of
reading comprehension, vocabulary, and analytic reasoning. The Quantitative
Reasoning subtest includes questions based mainly on the Mathematics curriculum
taught in elementary and high-school. The English subtest includes questions
aimed at assessing the ability to read and understand English texts at an academic
level.
Many
questions arise from this short description of PET. For example, the same PET
score is used for the selection of candidates for Biology studies, Philosophy,
and Law. Surely the abilities that are needed to succeed in these different
fields of study are different, so why is the same test being used?
A
similar point could be made about the Quantitative Reasoning section. Most
students do not need mathematical knowledge for their studies, so it is odd
that this domain is assessed for all candidates.
There
are other abilities that are relevant for many academic fields and are not
assessed in PET, such as writing skills, motivation, and creativity, to name a
few.
These
and other questions concern consumers of PET, both university candidates and decision-makers
in the universities. This paper will try to address these issues by explaining
why the current test content was chosen, why other contents do not appear in
the test, and why the format of the test is as it is.