Which validity can affect how well results from a test can be applied to real-world situations?

External validity refers to the extent to which the results of a study or test can be generalized to settings, people, and times outside the experimental conditions. When a test has high external validity, it means that the findings can be effectively applied to real-world situations, as they reflect reality beyond the specific context of the study.

For instance, if a psychological test shows that certain behaviors are linked to specific outcomes in a controlled lab environment, external validity assesses whether those findings hold true in everyday life. This aspect of validity is crucial for practical applications of research results, ensuring that they are relevant and useful beyond the original study’s scope.

In contrast, internal validity focuses on the integrity of the study itself and whether the results can be attributed to the manipulation of variables rather than extraneous influences. Predictive validity looks at how well a test forecasts future performance, while construct validity assesses how well a test measures the concept it is meant to measure. Though each of these other types of validity is important in its own right, they do not directly influence the generalizability of results to real-world situations in the same way external validity does.