Techniques and Procedures for Assessing Cognitive Skills

The intent of the article is to survey procedures that could be used to assess progress in instructional programs designed to enhance cognitive skills. The organizational framework is provided by J. R. Anderson’s (1982) theory of cognitive skill development and by Glaser, Lesgold, and Lajoie’s (1985) categorization of dimensions of cognitive skills. After describing Anderson’s theory, the article discusses the following types of measures of cognitive skills: (a) measures of knowledge acquisition, organization, and structure; (b) measures of depth of problem representation; (c) measures of mental models; (d) measures of metacognitive skills; (e) measures of the automaticity of performance; and (f) measures of efficiency of procedures. Each of the sections describing measurement procedures is followed by a discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of the procedures. The article closes with a general discussion of techniques for measuring cognitive skills.