Setting the Stage for Validity and Validation in Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences: Trends in Validation Practices

Abstract

This chapter sets the stage for the book Validity and Validation in Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences by examining trends in reporting practices. The book is a collection of inter-related chapters synthesizing the validation practices in the broad areas of social, behavioral, and health sciences with an eye towards improving the practice of measurement validation. The chapters also addressed whether recent work in validity theories (e.g. Kane MT, Validation. In: Brennan RL (ed) Educational measurement, 4th edn. American Council on Education/Praeger, Westport, pp 17–64, 2006; Messick S, Validity. In: Linn RL (ed) Educational measurement, 3rd edn. American Council on Education and Macmillan, New York, pp 13–103, 1989) or the Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing (AERA, APA, NCME, Standards for educational and psychological testing. American Educational Research Association, Washington, DC, 1999) were cited as informing the validation practice. In this opening chapter, Zumbo and Chan provide a brief sketch of the evolving concepts of validity theories and practices of validation as well as a description of an empirical database study of trends in validation practices since the 1960s.