Table 1.

Characteristics of the concept of validity as a social imperative identified in a concept analysis

Characteristics	Definition
Validity evidence seen as credible by society	Teaching institutions and regulatory agencies must be able to document, in a way that is perceived as credible by society, decisions made regarding a students’ knowledge, attitude, skills and competencies.
Validity built into the assessment process	Validity evidence includes the justification of decisions made during the development and administration of an assessment, and the interpretation of assessment results. This evidence includes consideration of the potential consequences that the interpretation of the assessment scores could have on the individual, the institution, and society.
Interpretation of the combination of assessment findings	Assessment data generated within an assessment program are often combined to make a final judgment. Validity evidence should be collected to support the combined or total score interpretation– evidences should align with the intended score use.
Validity evidence includes quantitative and qualitative data	Validity evidence must be collected using rigorous approaches, and attention should be paid to quantitative and qualitative data sources as legitimate validity evidence.

Adapted from Marceau et al.⁷