A Comparative Study of Interview and Paired Tests in Assessing Japanese Junior High School Students’ Linguistic Competence in Speaking Interaction

Abstract

This study investigated how two different speaking test formats—interview tests (i.e., student–teacher interaction) and paired tests (i.e., student–student interaction)—influence the type of linguistic competence elicited. Both the formats were administered to 40 second-year Japanese junior high school students, and their performance was assessed in terms of accuracy, fluency, and complexity. Significant differences were found in elicited fluency (words per minute) and lexical complexity, with the interview test producing more extensive speech and a wider vocabulary range. By contrast, no significant differences were observed in terms of accuracy, disfluency (repetition and self-correction), or syntactic complexity. These results suggest that the interview format is more effective when the aim is to elicit more fluent and lexically varied speech. However, the interview test format limited students’ opportunities to formulate questions—an essential aspect of interactive communication. Therefore, paired tests should also be administered. Furthermore, a close examination of students’ utterances revealed that their accuracy, fluency, and complexity in the paired test were influenced by their partners, particularly their degree of familiarity. Because the paired format may elicit varying linguistic performance depending on the interlocutor, multiple assessments with different partners are recommended to ensure more reliable and valid evaluations.