Sound evaluation planning requires numerous decisions about how constructs in a program theory will be translated into measures and instruments that produce evaluation data. This article, the first in a dialogue exchange, examines how decisions about measurement are (and should be) made, especially in the context of small-scale local program…

In this paper, the author considers certain aspects of the problem of obtaining unbiased information about the merits of a program or product, whether for purposes of decision making or for accountability. The evaluation of personnel, as well as the evaluation of proposals and evaluations, generally involves a different set of problems than those…

Good evaluation requires that evaluation efforts themselves be evaluated. Many things can and often do go wrong in evaluation work. Accordingly, it is necessary to check evaluations for problems such as bias, technical error, administrative difficulties, and misuse. Such checks are needed both to improve ongoing evaluation activities and to assess…

Over the past few years, the focus group method has assumed a very important role as a method for collecting qualitative data in social and behavioural science research. This article elucidates theoretical and practical problems and prospects associated with the use of focus groups as a qualitative research method in social and behavioural science…

Drug studies are often cited as the best exemplars of evaluation design. However, many of these studies are seriously biased in favor of positive findings for the drugs evaluated, even to the point where dangerous effects are hidden. In spite of using randomized designs and double blinding, drug companies have found ways of producing the results…

Some of the most important evaluation questions cannot be answered through experimental research. The "assessment" of the St. Louis Leadership Program (SLLP), sponsored by the Danforth Foundations, is used as an illustration of a "connoisseur-based study" approach to evaluation. The project team, given limited time and funds, decided that it could…

The purpose of this article is to discuss the problem of illusion in research, especially in program evaluation. Currently, there are multiple research traditions in program evaluation. Nevertheless, all research orientations are concerned with the role of researchers, for example, how they interpret their data and what evidence they offer for…

In this paper, the authors depict performance ethnography as having multiple ethical dimensions and multiple implications for the relationships between the evaluator and program participants. They have found performance ethnography to be essentially an intimate form of representation that has tremendous implications for the ownership of…