What Do the Meier-Seashore and the Mcadory Art Tests Measure?

Abstract

A short time before this investigation was undertaken, the writer had found that the correlation between scores earned in the Meier-Seashore Art Judgment Test and scores earned in the McAdory Art Test was but .27 ? .06, a barely reliable relationship. Evidently the two tests do not measure the same kind of art ability. It was thought that some light might be thrown upon the question as to precisely what each did measure by comparing results with instruc tors' judgments. Following up this possibility, the writer asked the seven members of the staff of the art education department of the Col lege of Education, University of Minnesota, to arrange in rank order the 103 students who were majoring in art. These instructors were directed to base their ratings on the comparative creative abilities of the students. Since each instructor was not thoroughly familiar with the abilities of the one hundred or so art majors, it became necessary to make some classification of the basis on wThich the opinions were given. The follow ing was finally decided upon : (1) comparatively ; (2) doubtful ; and (3) guess. From the scores given, composite ranks were arrived at for those who received comparatively and doubtful ratings, and for those who were represented in all three columns. A table was then drawn up showing the percentile ranks of each student according to his instructors' judgment, his success with the McAdory test, and his suc cess with the Meier-Seashore test. (See Table I). Instructors' judg ments in this table include only those which were classified as tively certain. The twenty students whose records are presented were chosen at random from the total of 103, the only limitation being that each must have been well enough known to have received a compara tively certain rating by at least four of his instructors. Since the in structors numbered seven, four constituted a majority. An examination of the comparative percentile ranks reveals immedi ately the marked disagreement among the three measures. For example,