The Test for the Identification of Mathematically Gifted Children (TIM3-5) adapted into Slovak
The Test for the Identification of Mathematically Gifted Children (TIM3–5) is one of the few methods available in the Czech Republic that can be used not only by psychologists but also by teachers. The test supports identifying exceptionally gifted children and children with mathematical talent in grades 3-5 of primary school. It is administered in a pencil-and-paper format, takes children one school hour (45 minutes) to complete, and has excellent psychometric parameters - among other things, it predicts very well the results of complex intelligence tests. The psychometric manual with all technical data is publicly available online. The test is scored using advanced statistical procedures using the Rasch model - to make this possible, scoring is provided by a simple online application that provides the user with a detailed report on each child examined, including analysis of individual responses to each test item.
In addition, the test has two interchangeable and fully equivalent forms that allow for group administration (and avoid cross-copying). Nevertheless, TIM3–5 is not suitable for flat administration to whole school classes, especially in the third year; it is very demanding for children and can be very stressful for average or below-average children. Moreover, it is only sufficiently reliable (i.e., it measures with sufficient precision) in the moderate to high above-average range. Thus, it does not provide much useful information for low-performing children.
In Slovakia, there is no method for similar purposes, and overall the offer of psychological tests is smaller than in the Czech Republic. For these reasons, the INPSY research team adapted the TIM3-5 into Slovak. The team members were the authors of the original test (Hynek Cígler, Michal Jabůrek, Ondřej Straka, and Šárka Portešová) and in addition Martina Šintálová (now working at the Centre for Transport Research), who carried out the research as part of her master thesis and also contributed substantially to the preparation of the following technical article.
However, in order to use any method of psychological diagnosis in a new linguistic or cultural environment, it is not enough to translate the necessary materials, the wording of test items, etc. In fact, psychological tests often work differently in different languages and cultures, and it is therefore necessary to document the necessary psychometric parameters of the new language adaptation using appropriate statistical analyses. This procedure can be quite challenging and may require relatively large research samples of respondents.
However, given the considerable linguistic and cultural proximity, the test can be expected to measure "sufficiently" in the same way in both countries. The researchers therefore chose an alternative procedure with a significantly smaller research sample, which is described in detail in a recent paper published in the journal Československá psychologie. Instead of validating all psychometric parameters, the research team focused on so-called differential item functioning (DIF) analysis and invariance analysis. The latter verifies whether the translated test items function in the same way and, thus, whether the "scale" and the measured characteristic itself are identical across the two language versions. Moreover, in the spirit of open science, the entire analytical procedure is completely transparent, the statistical script can be viewed by anyone in the Open Science Framework repository, and the data are available on request from the paper's authors.
This assumption was confirmed. The test measures the same psychological characteristics as the original Czech version, and the performance of Czech and Slovak children can be directly compared. In addition, excellent psychometric parameters were also observed in the Slovak sample. Therefore, TIM3–5 will now also be offered to Slovak users: school psychologists, teachers and other professionals.
Although the Slovak sample was not sufficient for the construction of the Slovak test standards, it allows comparability of the skins using the Czech standards. However, it is here that we encounter the main limit of the chosen procedure - the children in the Slovak sample showed significantly higher performance than the Czech children. Since there are no reasons for such fundamental differences in the population of Czech and Slovak schoolchildren, the research team believes that the reason for this is the method of sample construction and other circumstances discussed in the paper. Thus, the Slovak test user can use the Czech norms with reasonable caution - however, a more detailed verification of the reasons for these differences is the next task facing the researchers.
Reference
- The study: Šintálová, M., Cígler, H., Jabůrek, M., Portešová, Šárka, & Straka, O. (2024). Slovenská adaptácia Testu pre identifikáciu matematicky nadaných detí (TIM3–5): možnosti a obmedzenia použitia v praxi. Československá Psychologie, 68(2), 186-207. https://doi.org/10.51561/cspsych.68.2.186
- Data material: Cígler, H., Šintálová, M., & Jabůrek, M. (2024). Slovenská adaptácia Testu pre identifikáciu matematicky nadaných detí (TIM3–5): Možnosti a obmedzenia použitia v praxi. https://doi.org/10.17605/OSF.IO/6TFV4
