This study conducts a systematic literature review of 33 peer-reviewed articles on validity theory in language assessment published between January 2020 and December 2025, guided by PRISMA 2020 reporting standards. The review identifies four recurring humanist assumptions embedded in validity discourse. The rational autonomous test taker, language as a purely human construct, the neutral assessor assumption, and human-centered consequential validity and reconceptualises each through a posthumanist theoretical framework drawing on Barad (2007), Braidotti (2013), and Haraway (1988, 2013). A diffractive analysis produces theoretical reconceptualisations relevant to the future of validity theory in an era of AI-mediated and multilingual assessment.
Khartha et al. (Thu,) studied this question.
Synapse has enriched 5 closely related papers on similar clinical questions. Consider them for comparative context: