what is convergent validity

Convergent validity is a type of construct validity that refers to the degree to which two measures that theoretically should be related, are in fact related. It is used to assess whether constructs that theoretically should be related to each other are, in fact, related to each other. To establish convergent validity, a test of a construct is correlated with other tests designed to measure theoretically similar constructs. For example, to assess the convergent validity of a test of mathematics skills, the scores on the test are correlated with scores on other tests that are also designed to measure basic mathematics ability. High correlations between the test scores would be evidence of convergent validity. Convergent validity is usually accomplished by demonstrating a correlation between the two measures, although it’s rare that any two measures will be perfectly convergent.