Bilingualism and Psychometrics

Abstract

The empirical literature on test bias with ethnic children has been at odds with much of the case law on testing and overrepresentation in special education classes. This article reviews some of the literature that asserts that the legal mandates may have actually hurt minority children and argues that for bilingual children such a position is specious insofar as it ignores the cognitive dimensions of bilingualism and the impact of bilingualism on psychometric tests. It is proposed that the case law may actually be inadequate to protect bilingual children from misdiagnosis and that the most prudent position may well be to exclude psychometric tests from any aspect of decision making with bilingual populations.