Interpreting Learning Under Competing Models: Joint and Stepwise Approaches for Dynamic Cognitive Diagnosis
Digital learning environments record learners' responses to individual items, making it possible to study the development of specific skills rather than overall scores. Drawing conclusions about learning from these data requires a model that links responses to latent skills and tracks how mastery changes over time. When the skills measured by each item are unknown, the analyst must decide whether to estimate this structure, the Q-matrix, jointly with the learning process, or to establish it first and study learning afterwards. We show that this decision can change substantive conclusions about how learners develop. Using dynamic cognitive diagnostic models, we analyse data from two readin...
| Authors | Yawen Ma, Sahoko Ishida, Kate Cain et al. |
|---|---|
| Primary category | cs.LG |
| Published | 5 June 2026 |
| Last updated at source | 5 June 2026 |
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