The History of Stealth Assessment and a Peek Into Its Future

Interactions with digital environments can yield huge amounts of electronic data—in terms of what was done, when, where, and how. What's known today as stealth assessment arose from a single question four decades ago: How can we mine digital data for meaningful information about a person's cognitive and noncognitive states, then use it to enhance learning? This query undergirded early work in intelligent tutoring systems but was handicapped by the technology of the time. This chapter describes the evolution of the concept and functioning of stealth assessment across the decades—how it emerged and where it may go in the future.