Test candidates' attitudes and their test performance: The case of the Fudan

Abstract

This study investigated test candidates’ attitudes to the Fudan English Test (FET), a university-based English proficiency test, and explored the relationships between test candidates’ attitudes, test taker characteristics, and test performance. The participants in this study were 157 students who had just attempted the FET. A questionnaire and an interview guide were designed to collect the data. Exploratory factor analysis extracted five attitudinal factors. Descriptive statistics at the factor level indicated that test candidates had the most positive attitudes to test administration and least positive attitudes to the mode of the computer-based speaking test. Factorial MANOVA showed that test candidates’ gender and academic backgrounds had no significant effect on their reported attitudes. Stepwise regression analyses showed that two attitudinal factors, attitude to test washback and attitude to test information explained 9.4% of the test score variance. As well as presenting the FET provider with additional evidence about the quality of the test, this study also lends empirical support to the argument that attitudinal factors need to be taken into serious consideration in test development and validation.