The construct validity of curriculum-based measurement of reading: An empirical test of a plausible rival hypothesis

Research has confirmed that curriculum-based measurement (CBM) of oral read ing fluency and measures of reading comprehension are highly correlated, as predicted by developmental theories of reading. Research on CBM, however, has only begun to rule out plausible alternative explanations of this relat ionship-an important aspect of a strong program of construct validation (e. g., Messick, 1989). This study investigated one such rival hypothesis by ex amining the relative roles of general cognitive ability, speed and efficien cy of elemental cognitive processing, and oral reading fluency in the predi ction of reading comprehension. Results of simultaneous multiple regression analyses substantiate the construct validity of CBM oral reading fluency. These findings indicate that the significant relationship between oral read ing fluency and reading comprehension cannot be explained by general cognit ive ability or by processing speed and efficiency. CBM oral reading fluency also did not correlate significantly with any of the processing speed and efficiency tasks. Interestingly, however, CBM oral reading fluency accounte d for less variance in reading comprehension (r(2) = .17) than expected bas ed on the results of previous research and less than that explained by gene ral cognitive ability (r(2) = .24). When controlling for psychometric g and processing speed in the regression analyses, CBM oral reading explained 11 % of the variance in reading comprehension. Implications of these results f or further research on the construct validity of CBM are discussed. (C) 199 8 Society for the Study of School Psychology. Published by Elsevier Science Ltd.