BASIE is a framework for interpreting impact estimates from evaluations. It is an alternative to null hypothesis significance testing. This guide walks researchers through the key steps of applying BASIE, including selecting prior evidence, reporting impact estimates, interpreting impact estimates, and conducting sensitivity analyses. The guide…

Evaluations of vocational education and training (VET) programs play a key role in informing training policy in Australia and elsewhere. Increasingly, such evaluations use observational data from surveys or administrative collections to assess the effectiveness of VET programs and interventions. The difficulty associated with using observational…

This research examined the issue of nonresponse bias and how it was reported in nonexperimental quantitative research published in the "Delta Pi Epsilon Journal" between 1995 and 2004. Through content analysis, 85 articles consisting of 91 separate samples were examined. In 72.5% of the cases, possible nonresponse bias was not examined in the…

Most traditional models, frameworks, and findings that apply to the majority of students and faculty do not adequately apply to important subpopulations. The recommendations here will help researchers become more sensitive to the nuances among various educational subgroups, and to pay more attention to outliers.

The concept of statistical significance is explained, with specific numerical illustrations. (MNS)

The purpose of the study was to determine whether students had knowledge of the extension rule (the conjunction of two or more events cannot be greater than the probability of any one of those events) and understanding of conjunction by giving a test of multiplicative probabilities. Involved were 598 students enrolled in introductory psychology…

Identifies key questions concerning children's intuitions and conceptions of probabilistic notions. Research on the theoretical framework for probability studies, misconceptions and strategies, and pupil attainment is reviewed, and the methodology is evaluated. Finally, implications for classroom practice are discussed. (MNS)

In the educational research literature alpha, the a priori level of significance, and p, the a posteriori probability of obtaining a test statistic of at least a certain value when the null hypothesis is true, are often confused. Explanations for this confusion are offered. Paradoxically, alpha retains a prominent place in textbook discussions of…

Four experiments investigated college students' judgments of inter-event contingency. Subjects were asked to judge the effect of a discrete response (tapping a wire) on the occurrence of a brief outcome (a radio's buzzing). Pairings of the possible event-state combinations were presented in a summary table, an unbroken time line, or a broken time…

The goal of books in this series is to present work that is on the growing tip of research in cognitive development. The theme of this volume is children's logical and mathematical cognition, a field in which Piaget's influence has been extensive. In the first of the six chapters, Acredolo presents a new theory of the cognitive bases for…

Forty-eight students with no previous exposure to probability or statistics read one of three textbooks that varied in emphasis placed on rote and conceptual learning of basic elementary probability concepts. Findings, among others, show students who read textbooks emphasizing conceptual learning tended to be less sensitive to surface features.…

Related research suggests that children may show some simple understanding of event covariations by the early elementary school years. The present experiments use a rule analysis methodology to investigate covariation judgments of children in this age range. In Experiment 1, children in second, third and fourth grade judged covariations on 12…

A collection of student distortions, represented by student-invented variations of theorems, are presented. They were drawn from examination papers of 17-year-old students in Israel. (MNS)

Past research indicates poor agreement about strategies people use to assess covariation between events. This research investigates method of assessment as one possible source of this low consensus. A set of problems was developed in such a way that different judgment rules would produce different decisions about the relationships between events.…

Four strategies used in judgment patterns were explored. Problem sets in which each solution strategy produces a unique solution pattern are depicted. Several experiments had been conducted using rules in this way with subjects from grade 4 through college. Problems were set in the context of concrete events which could be related, and subjects…