Face validity is a property of a test intended to measure something. It is the validity of a test at face value. In other words, a test can be said to have face validity if it "looks like" it is going to measure what it is supposed to measure. For instance, if you prepare a test to measure whether students can perform multiplication, and the people you show it to all agree that it looks like a good test of multiplication ability, you have shown the face validity of your test.
Some people use the term face validity only to refer to the validity of observers who are not expert in testing methodologies. For instance, if you have a test that is designed to measure whether children are good spellers, and you ask their parents whether the test is a good test, you are studying the face validity of the test. If you ask an expert in testing spelling, some people would argue that you are not testing face validity. This distinction seems too careful for most applications. Generally face validity means that the test "looks like" it will work, as opposed to "has been shown to work".
Face validity is often contrasted with Content validity.
Read more about Face Validity: Simulation
Famous quotes containing the words face and/or validity:
“my face I don’t mind it,
Because I’m behind it—
‘Tis the folks in the front that I jar.”
—Anthony Euwer (1877–1955)
“There are ... two minimum conditions necessary and sufficient for the existence of a legal system. On the one hand those rules of behavior which are valid according to the system’s ultimate criteria of validity must be generally obeyed, and on the other hand, its rules of recognition specifying the criteria of legal validity and its rules of change and adjudication must be effectively accepted as common public standards of official behavior by its officials.”
—H.L.A. (Herbert Lionel Adolphus)