A Case of Inconsistent Equatings: How the Man With Four Watches Decides What Time It Is.

A simultaneous equating of four new test forms to each other and to one previous form was accomplished through a complex design incorporating seven separate equating links. Each new form was linked to the reference form by four different paths, and each path produced a different score conversion. The procedure used to resolve these inconsistencies was applied separately at each score level. Considering each equating (at a given score level) as a simple additive increment and imposing constraints on those increments led to a system of seven equations in seven unknowns. The solution produced a set of adjusted increments, so that the linking of any new form to the reference form was the same by all four possible paths. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]