Japan Child Panel Survey: Reliability and Validity of the Academic Ability Test (English translation of DP-2010-004)
This study aimed to shed light on how family background is related to children’s
cognitive ability. In order to carry this out, the Japan Child Panel Survey (JCPS)
selected parents who have elementary and junior high school children from among the
Japan Household Panel Survey (JHPS) subjects. Subsequently, concomitantly with
JHPS follow-ups, the children and their parents were surveyed. In this paper, analysis
was conducted on the data pertaining to 461 children from 312 households that were
collected during the first survey conducted in 2010. Through this analysis, the
reliability and validity of the JCPS academic ability test was verified. The high internal
consistency of the item groups belonging to the three factors, arithmetic/mathematics,
Japanese language, and reasoning, showed that the JCPS academic ability test has
excellent reliability. A comparison with existing academic ability test data by prefecture
showed that each item of the JCPS academic ability test has construct validity. The
correlation between test scores for arithmetic/mathematics and Japanese language and
the grades in both school subjects as reported by the parents showed that the
construct measured by the JCPS academic ability test has concurrent validity. The
scores for the JCPS academic ability test were validated as an effective index of
academic ability.
