Create an IRT Design Specification

Define the data-generating model for an IRT simulation study. This captures decisions 1–3 from the Schroeders & Gnambs (2025) framework: dimensionality, item parameters, and item type.

Usage

irt_design(model, n_items, item_params, theta_dist = "normal", n_factors = 1L)

Arguments

model

Character string specifying the IRT model. One of "1PL", "2PL", or "GRM".

n_items

Positive integer. Number of items in the instrument.

item_params

A named list of item parameters. Contents depend on model:

1PL

b (numeric vector of length n_items). Discrimination is fixed at 1 for all items and added automatically.

2PL

a (discrimination, positive numeric vector or matrix) and b (difficulty, numeric vector), each of length n_items.

GRM

a (discrimination, positive numeric vector) of length n_items and b (threshold matrix, n_items rows by n_categories - 1 columns).

theta_dist

Either a character string ("normal" or "uniform") or a function that takes a single argument n and returns a numeric vector of length n. Defaults to "normal".

n_factors

Positive integer specifying the number of latent factors. Defaults to 1L. Currently only n_factors = 1 is supported; multidimensional IRT (n_factors > 1) is planned for v0.4.0. Passing any value other than 1 raises an error rather than silently propagating an unsupported design to the estimator.

Value

An S3 object of class irt_design (a named list) with elements model, n_items, item_params, theta_dist, and n_factors.

See also

irt_study() to add study conditions, irt_params_2pl() and irt_params_grm() to generate item parameters.

Examples

# 1PL (Rasch) design with 20 items
design_1pl <- irt_design(
  model = "1PL",
  n_items = 20,
  item_params = list(b = seq(-2, 2, length.out = 20))
)

# 2PL design
design_2pl <- irt_design(
  model = "2PL",
  n_items = 30,
  item_params = list(
    a = rlnorm(30, 0, 0.25),
    b = seq(-2, 2, length.out = 30)
  )
)