ABSTRACT
Checklists, rating scales, rubrics, and questionnaires are instruments that state specific criteria to gather information and to make judgments about what students, trainees, and instructors know and can do in outcomes. A checklist is an instrument for identifying the presence or absence of knowledge, skills, behaviors, or attitudes. Surgery has made extensive use of checklists as they have been promoted in an attempt to prevent mistakes related to surgery. The World Health Organization has developed a surgical safety checklist that has been widely disseminated and adopted. Rating scales are similar to checklists except that they indicate the degree of behavior rather than dichotomous judgment such as “yes” or “no”. Rating scales allow instructors or students to indicate the degree or frequency of the behaviors, skills, and strategies displayed by the person rated. Rating scales state the criteria and provide selections to describe the quality or frequency of the performance.
