Chapter 2: Consistency and Validity in Game-Based Stealth Assessment

In this chapter, we start by presenting the current state of assessment, and then argue for the use of games as a viable alternative to traditional assessment, illustrated within the context of a recent stealth assessment project. The research project involves the game Physics Playground (Shute & Ventura, 2013), which includes three stealth assessments running concurrently and invisibly in the game—measuring physics understanding, creativity, and persistence directly from gameplay data. The underlying models and mechanisms that comprise the stealth assessments are presented, along with examples of how evidence was identified and accumulated in the models. Finally, we describe how we established validity and consistency for the Physics Playground stealth assessments, and conclude with a discussion of future research in this area.