• Background
• Introduction
• Objectives
• Development
• Timeline
• Scope
• Audience
• Factors
• Test Developers
• Test Publishers
• Test Users
• Official Translations
• Acknowledgements
• References
• Appendix
• Glossary

International Test Commission

International Guidelines on Computer-Based and Internet Delivered Testing

Contextual factors

The guidelines are intended to be applicable internationally. Many factors may affect how standards may be managed and realised in practice. These contextual factors have to be considered at the local level when interpreting these guidelines and defining what they would mean in practice within any particular setting.

The factors that need to be considered for turning the guidelines into specific standards include:

• social, political, institutional, linguistic, and cultural differences between assessment settings;
• laws, statutes, policy and other legal documentation that addresses testing issues;
• laws applying to the various countries through which test data may pass or be stored;
• existing national guidelines and performance standards set by professional psychological societies and associations;
• differences relating to individual versus group assessment;
• differences related to the test setting (educational, clinical, work-related and other assessment);
• who the primary recipients of the test results are (e.g., the test-takers, their parents or guardian, the test developer, an employer or other third party);
• differences relating to the use of test results (e.g., for decision-making, as in selection screening, or for providing information to support guidance or counselling); and
• variations in the degree to which opportunity exists for the accuracy of interpretations to be checked in light of subsequent information and amended if needed.