Content/Criterion-Related Validity of Iranian Domestically-Developed Standard English Proficiency Tests: Focus on the Reading Section

The study aimed at investigating content and criterion-related validity of the reading sections of three Iranian Standard English proficiency tests, namely, EPT, TOLIMO, and MSRT. For content validity, the framework advanced by Bachman and Palmer (۱۹۹۶) was employed by scrutinizing characteristics of input as well as the expected response, which included parameters such as length, difficulty level, topic, genre, and question type. To do this end, a cross-examination of the selected tests was conducted with IELTS as the criterion. For the criterion- related validity, the correlation between scores of a sample of Iranian masters TEFL students, study at Islamic Azad University at Shahreza, on each domestically-developed test and those on IELTS was computed using the Pearson correlation. The results revealed that there existed some differences in terms of content validity between the set of in-house tests and IELTS though statistically the difference were not significant. For criterion-related validity, only MSRT turned out to have a statistically significant correlation with IELTS, but the relationship showed to be weak. The findings highlight the importance of improving the tests. Obviously, there are some implications for test takers and exam prep instructors, too.