The British Army Recruit Battery Goes Operational: From Theory to Practice in Computer‐Based Testing Using Item‐Generation Techniques

The British Army Recruit Battery (BARB) was commissioned in 1986 by the Army Personnel Research Establishment (APRE) under a mandate from the Directorate of Army Recruiting as part of a programme of strategic research. Item-generation from computer algorithms and computer delivery of the battery are the two fundamental building blocks of the BARB system and they are described in detail. In addition, reports of the psychometric properties of the battery and the results of validity studies are provided. A true score model of reliability is outlined and its utility demonstrated by comparing predicted reliabilities against operational test–retest reliabilities.