2. 136 Language Testing 31(1)
Encyclopedic Dictionary of Language Testing (hereafter EDLT) was therefore the first
major reference work available in the field of language testing and the only one that has
been frequently updated ever since. EDLT was written with a broad and diverse reader-
ship in mind, ranging from language test developers and teacher educators to measure-
ment specialists and language policy makers. The dictionary contains entries that are
mostly pertinent, but often not exclusive, to language testing. Many of the terms are sta-
tistical or psychometric terms employed in assessment and testing in general, such as bias
analysis, Cronbach’s alpha, distractor analysis, point-biserial correlation, discrimination
index, Fisher Z transformation, and others. General assessment terms, such as discrete-
point item, construct, diagnostic test, portfolio assessment, fairness, and task-based
assessment are also present. Other terms are unique to language testing and assessment,
such as target language use domain, reading comprehension test, oral proficiency inter-
view (OPI), Modern Language Aptitude Test (MLAT), and oral cloze, among others.
EDLT has a user-friendly design. Every page of the dictionary has a black box on the
margin indicating the current alphabet letter. In addition, a standard practice of using
guide words has been employed (this is not the case with the other two aforementioned
volumes). At the top of each left page, users can find an indication of the first entry on
that page and, at the top of each right page, an indication of the last entry on that page.
These two characteristics make it easier for readers to navigate through the dictionary
and locate a given entry, in addition to giving the work its Encyclopedic denomination.
Cross-referencing of the A–Z entries in the dictionary is employed to help readers access
other entries related to a given term. In addition, typographical notations such as small
capital letters and italics (among others) are used to indicate to the reader alternative
names for a certain term, related terms, and other terms whose understanding is essential
for the comprehension of the current entry.
With regard to format, the definition part of each main entry in the dictionary (i.e.
those that are not alternative names of a concept) is followed by a list of references where
readers can find further discussion of the topic. The list of references for the entries often
includes a large number of sources, such as the 18 different references provided for the
term testing and the 16 references indicated for readability.
A significant difference that readers of this dictionary will easily notice if they com-
pare EDLT with the ALTE glossary and with Davies et al.’s dictionary is the length and
thoroughness of the definition of the terms. Many of the entries in Mousavi’s dictionary
span several pages, with detailed explanation and exemplification of the terms when pos-
sible. Longer entries in the dictionary contain paragraph headings, making it easier for
readers to locate information about individual aspects related to that term/concept. For
example, the entry for testing (p. 773), which spans roughly five pages, has the following
headings: Historical Background, The Why of Testing, Objections against Testing,
Approaches to Language Testing, and Is Language Testing a Profession? The entry for
test item, for instance, covers over eight pages and contains very detailed information
about what a test item is, criteria for good items and the major differences among various
item types employed in each of the four skills, including the advantages and limitations
of each.
Some of these longer entries make use of tables and graphs in order to exemplify and/
or clarify the meaning of the respective terms. In addition, at various points in the
3. Book reviews 137
dictionary, the author makes use of illustrations either to depict the concept at hand or
simply to make the material more interesting and visually appealing to its readers. The
immediate connection between the images chosen and the concepts they represent are
straightforward in most cases; whereas in others they seem to be pictorial metaphors.
While being commonplace in EDLT, the use of such visuals is either very scarce or non-
existent in the other two volumes.
In order to have a quantifiable picture of the terminological coverage found in EDLT,
this reviewer selected some terms (in addition to asking others in the field of language
testing) that he would expect to see covered in a dictionary of language testing. Of the 24
terms selected,2 19 are covered in Davies et al.’s dictionary and 17 are covered in An
Encyclopedic Dictionary of Language Testing, indicating that both dictionaries have
similar coverage of key terms in the language testing field, despite the large difference in
the number of entries found in each one. The fifth and current edition of EDLT was pub-
lished thirteen years after the publication of the Dictionary of Language Testing by
Davies et al. As a result, some more recent terms such as CEFR (officially published in
2001) are only present in EDLT. In addition, EDLT contains a higher concentration of
statistical terms and alternative names for terms, which naturally increases the number of
entries found therein. Therefore, we can conclude that the true encyclopedic nature of
EDLT is due not to a larger coverage of relevant and purely language-testing-related
terms. Instead, it is due to a considerably deeper treatment of the terms and concepts, a
more user-friendly design and the significantly larger and, to some extent, more up-to-
date number of reference works indicated for each of the entries.
Many of the readers of EDLT will likely be content with the depth of explanation of
most entries and not feel a need to consult the references at the end of the entries for
further clarification. These references on their own constitute 115 pages of bibliography
at the end of the dictionary. EDLT concludes with 12 pages providing the website
addresses for approximately 160 prominent language testing associations, journals, pro-
fessional organizations, periodical international conferences, and testing agencies.
Despite its user-friendly design, wide and detailed coverage of terms, and the inclu-
sion of relevant references at the end of each entry, EDLT still has room for improve-
ment. Some of the entries in the dictionary are quite peripheral to language testing and
do not add much to a dictionary of language testing per se. Examples of these are teacher
interviews, Gestalt Psychology, psychometrician, penmanship, and experimental varia-
ble. In addition, there are a large number of entries in EDLT that are simply alternative,
rarely used names for more standard concepts and terms, such as the entries surface cred-
ibility for face validity, penmanship for handwriting, and end-test for post-test. The effect
of having these peripheral and/or infrequent terms as actual entries in EDLT is that they
increase the absolute number of entries in the dictionary, perhaps giving readers the
impression that they will find 1300 terms that are all directly related to language testing
(accompanied by their definition), which is not the case. However, these extra terms do
not affect the quality of the terms that are indeed relevant.
Other shortcomings of the volume include the fact that during the process of this
review, a case was found in which an alternative name for a given term constitutes in fact
a somewhat different concept. The term type-token ratio is suggested as an alternative
name for lexical density (p. 418). Lastly, EDLT would benefit from two additions: a
4. 138 Language Testing 31(1)
higher percentage of references from the past 10 years (the majority of the references are
from the 1970s, 1980s, or 1990s) and the inclusion, at the end, of a subject index, as one
can find in Davies et al.’s dictionary.
In summary, An Encyclopedic Dictionary of Language Testing, 5th edition is a wel-
come addition to the field of language testing. It is an impressive piece of work with good
coverage of terms, clear definitions, a good level of depth, and a user-friendly design. The
terms covered are mostly up-to-date and the substantial number of references provided is
certainly helpful for those wishing to explore further a given concept. The shortcomings
discussed in this review notwithstanding, this dictionary is useful for a broad range of
users involved in language testing and assessment, such as students in language testing
courses, language teachers, language programme managers, language test developers,
language testing specialists, and language educators who want to know more about lan-
guage testing. An Encyclopedic Dictionary of Language Testing (5th edition) is a refer-
ence work that makes the task of understanding the terms, concepts, and measures
associated with language testing not only less daunting, but also more enjoyable.
Notes
1. The languages are Catalan, Danish, Dutch, English, French, German, Irish, Italian, Portuguese,
and Spanish.
2. The terms chosen are readability, reading comprehension, prochievement test, discrete-point
test, semi-direct test, SOPI, OPI, Modern Language Aptitude Test, trialing, First Certificate
of English, unitary competency hypothesis, CALT, Interagency Language Roundtable (profi-
ciency) scale, CEFR, Critical Language Testing, evidence-centered design, TOEFL, English
for Specific Purposes, fluency, IELTS, LTRC, lexical density, ACTFL, and target language.
References
Association of Language Teachers in Europe & University of Cambridge. (1998). Multilingual
glossary of language testing terms. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bachman, L., & Palmer, A. (2010). Language assessment in practice: Developing language
assessment and justifying their use in the real world. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Davies, A., Brown, A., Elder, C., Hill, K., Lumley, T., & McNamara, T. (1999). Dictionary of
language testing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Saville, N. (2012). Quality management in test production and administration. In G. Fulcher &
F. Davidson (Eds.), The Routledge handbook of language testing (pp. 395–412). Abingdon,
Oxon: Routledge.
G. Fulcher and F. Davidson (Eds.)
The Routledge Handbook of LanguageTesting.
Routledge, 2012. xiv + 536 pp. ISBN: 978-0-415-57063, £140.00 (hbk), ISBN: 978-0-
203-181287 £(not yet available) (ebk)
Reviewed by: Catherine Elder, The University of Melbourne,Australia
Thirty years ago language testing was defined as a methodology in the service of the
larger discipline of applied linguistics (Davies, 1982). The appearance of the Routledge
