Evaluations of the risk of recurrent violence were conducted for 162 Canadian mentally disordered criminal defendants through the assembly of actuarial data, scores from special-to-purpose psychometric instruments, and scaled global predictions of dangerousness to others. Professional clinicians were not more accurate than nonclinical raters. (JPS)

Describes two invariance tests, the jackknife procedure and Procrustean rotation, and applies them in a discriminant analysis for this heuristic study. Invariance testing helps to prevent overemphasis on findings of statistical significance and overgeneralization of a research result, and thus is gaining favor as an indicator of result importance.…

A method for incorporating decline over time of the predictive validity of scores into mental test theory is presented. The procedure utilizes concepts from multiple regression and analysis of repeated measures. (JKS)

Conducted a Monte Carlo computer simulation of the ANOVA design to detect job differences. The design proved reasonably powerful in detecting differences. A second study used Monte Carlo methods to analyze the viability of techniques for determining job differences. Offers guidelines for selecting statistical techniques. (Author/RC)

When a number of school readiness tests were used with a group of 322 kindergarten children to predict end of first-grade Metropolitan Achievement Test scores, no evidence of racial bias and only minimal effects of sex bias were found in the predictions based on analysis of variance. (CTM)

Studied the relationship between the ease with which children use orthographic analogies and their reading skills. Results of an experiment using a reading age match design showed that poor readers performed as well as normal readers on orally presented measures of onset/rhyme sensitivity, but less well on visually/orally presented rhyme tasks.…

Criticizes the statistical procedures commonly employed to justify assumptions of the comparable validity and predictability of cognitive tests among different populations. (GC)

Describes a study of 38 students at Eastern Oregon State College which identified mathematics proficiency as the key student characteristic leading to successful completion of computer science courses, and developed a model that accounts for 82 percent of the variation in students' final grades in computer courses for use by advisers. (LRW)

Examines appropriacy of a nationally standardized test normed on English speakers but used with non-English speaking students. Data from the school year are analyzed via reliability comparison, exploratory factor analysis, and comparison of variances. The use of the test was statistically defensible. This finding does not address the need for…