Composite scores are an exceptionally important psychometric tool for behavioral science research applications. A prototypical example occurs with self-report data, where researchers routinely use questionnaires with multiple items that tap into different features of a target construct. Item-level missing data are endemic to composite score…

The purpose of this paper is to analyze various dimensions for measurement of human behavior. Human behaviour is complex. Behaviors, emotions, cognitions, and attitudes can rarely be described in terms of one or two variables. It is multimodal in nature. Furthermore, the traits, modalities and dimensions cannot be measured directly, but must be…

Missing data are a pervasive problem in many psychological applications in the real world. In this article we study the impact of dropout on the operational characteristics of several approaches that can be easily implemented with commercially available software. These approaches include the covariance pattern model based on an unstructured…

We reviewed all research articles in 10 recent volumes of the "Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (JABA)": Vol. 28(3), 1995, through Vol. 38(2), 2005. Continuous recording was used in the majority (55%) of the 168 articles reporting data on free-operant human behaviors. Three methods for reporting interobserver agreement (exact agreement,…

Correlational analyses are one of the most popular quantitative methods, yet also one of the mostly frequently misused methods in social and behavioral research, especially when analyzing ordinal data from Likert or other rating scales. Although several correlational analysis options have been developed for ordinal data, there seems to be a lack…

Visual inspection of data is a common method for understanding, responding to, and communicating important behavior-environment relations in single-subject research. In a field that was once dominated by cumulative, moment-to-moment records of behavior, a number of graphic forms currently exist that aggregate data into larger units. In this…

An obstacle to broader acceptability of effect sizes in single case research is their lack of intuitive and useful interpretations. Interpreting Cohen's d as "standard deviation units difference" and R[superscript 2] as "percent of variance accounted for" do not resound with most visual analysts. In fact, the only comparative analysis widely…

The focus on the individual that is possible in analyzing behavioral data provides the possibility of investigating sequencing effects. Autocorrelation--as illustrated with classroom data from a previous study--can cause standard procedures to underestimate the magnitude of measurement error. Recommendations are made to reduce the effects of…

Second-generation immigrants are typically analyzed under the assumption that, having been born in the United States, they grew up in the United States. We challenge this assumption by investigating the prevalence and patterns of second-generation Mexican-American children's migration to and return from Mexico during childhood, and consider the…

This paper presents selected findings from an ESRC-funded research project examining the choices and occupational aspirations of 59 students approaching the end of their compulsory schooling. It concentrates on the development of a choice model conceptualising the decisionmaking processes of the young people involved in the study, whilst avoiding…

In this article, we argue for a change in how researchers study motivation to learn. We believe that research can provide better explanations of the origins and outcomes of behavior, and thus be more useful, if we focus on how motivation develops and why it changes. We suggest reframing motivation research in education by extending the current…

The authors compare the operating characteristics of the bootstrap-F approach, a direct extension of the work of Berkovits, Hancock, and Nevitt, with Huynh's improved general approximation (IGA) and the Brown-Forsythe (BF) multivariate approach in a mixed repeated measures design when normality and multisample sphericity assumptions do not hold.…

Inferences made in integrative research reviews are as important to the validity of behavioral science knowledge as are those in primary research. The research review is conceptualized as a scientific inquiry involving five stages paralleling those of primary research. Problem formulation is the stage when variables are defined conceptually and…

Differences in agreement between observers and analysts of naturalistic narrative data cause problems in observation research. This paper discusses the advantages and disadvantages of several possible solutions. (Author/GDC)

This paper analyzes ways in which the methods used to measure psychological constructs contribute invalidity to measurements. The analysis distinguishes between inadequacies stemming from the behaviors selected for measurement and the harmful effects generated by the measurement operations themselves. (BS)