Executive functioning in three groups of pupils in D-KEFS: Selected issues in adapting the test battery for Slovakia

• Authors: Ján Ferjenčík , Miriam Slavkovská , Juraj Kresila
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

The paper reports on the adaptation of a D-KEFS test battery for Slovakia. Drawing on concrete examples, it describes and illustrates the key issues relating to the transfer of test items from one socio-cultural environment to another. The standardisation sample of the population of Slovak pupils in the fourth year of primary school included 250 children with an average age of 9.7 years. The two comparative samples of the same age range were analysed at the same time. They included pupils from classes for gifted children (n = 55) and Roma children from socially disadvantaging environments (n = 50). The results manifested a significant skewness in most distributions of the D- -KEFS primary indicator raw scores. The nature of the skewness suggests that these indicators are more sensitive at discriminating the performance of weaker children but not at discriminating within the above-average performance range. The distribution in the Roma children sample was skewed to the opposite value. Most of the Roma children found the tests from the D-KEFS battery, especially those based on verbal materials, too difficult and so it only differentiated results achieved by the best in the group. Comparisons of the mean scores in all the primary indicators (One-way ANOVA) highlight the need to establish specific norms for the standard population of Slovak children on the one hand and for Roma children from socially disadvantaging environment on the other

Keywords

EN

Delis-Kaplan; executive functions; test adaptation

• Publisher: Sciendo
• Journal: Journal of Pedagogy
• Year: 2015
• Volume: 6
• Issue: 1
• Pages: 73-92

Dates

published

2015-06-01

online

2015-07-24

Contributors

author

Ján Ferjenčík

• Pavol Jozef Safarik University Faculty of Arts Department of Psychology Moyzesova 9 040 01 Košice Slovakia

author

Miriam Slavkovská

• Pavol Jozef Safarik University Faculty of Arts Department of Psychology Department of Psychology Moyzesova 9 040 01 Košice Slovakia

author

Juraj Kresila

• Prešovská univerzita v Prešove Pedagogická fakulta Katedra komunikačnej a literárnej výchovy Ul. 17. novembra 15 080 01 Prešov

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Identifiers

DOI

10.1515/jped-2015-0005