Traditional Culture Versus Traditional Assessment for American Indian Students: An Investigation of Potential Test Item Bias

The Bayley Scales of Infant Development II (BSID-II) and the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Third Edition (WISC-III) are frequently used across cultures in standard assessment batteries for learners between 6 and 17 years of age, respectively. Responses of American Indian students on the BSID-II and WISC-III were examined for patterns of performance across items. Information gathered from the BSID-II protocols indicate that expressive language items were lower than scores obtained in other categories and lower than scores on the total group of items. Results from the WISC-III suggest that, in some situations, student performance may be distorted. Issues of poverty, remoteness, access to resources, and health care need to be considered before sweeping conclusions can be made about performance on nationally normed, standardized instruments. Results may indicate that testing of American Indian students results in an inaccurate assessment due to cultural biases of test items.