Construct validity assesses whether...

• A. The degree to which a test reflects the content domain
• B. The degree to which a test yields consistent results over time
• C. The degree to which a theoretical construct is measured by the test
• D. The degree to which scores correlate with unrelated constructs

Answer: (C)

Construct validity asks whether the test truly measures the theoretical quality it’s meant to assess. It’s about the alignment between what the test claims to measure and the actual construct described by the theory. Good evidence for this comes from showing the test relates to other measures of the same construct (and does not relate to measures of different constructs), supporting that it taps the intended idea.

This is different from content validity, which focuses on whether the test covers the relevant subject matter, and from reliability, which concerns whether the results are consistent over time or across items. If the test scores show a strong relationship with unrelated constructs, that suggests the test isn’t measuring the intended construct at all, undermining its validity.