Scale validation is vital to psychological research because it ensures that scores from measurement scales represent the intended construct. Factor analysis fit indices are commonly used to provide quantitative evidence that a proposed factor structure is plausible. However, there is mismatch between guidelines for evaluating fit of factor models…

Based on a one-year longitudinal experimental study with 3,782 kindergarten school children across 15 countries, this article examines the association between prayer and happiness. Results show that the post-test scores on the faces scale were higher for the participant group who had taken the prayer lessons vis-à-vis the comparison group.…

The purpose of this article is to describe preliminary psychometric characteristics of a student self-report measure of self-determination, the "Self-Determination Inventory: Student Report" version (SDI-SR), designed for youth with and without disabilities. We administered the draft assessment to 311 youth and examined item functioning…

This study investigated how affective factors like attitude and motivation contribute to science achievement in PISA 2006 using linear structural modeling. The data set of PISA 2006 collected from 4942 fifteen-year-old Turkish students (2290 females, 2652 males) was used for the statistical analyses. A total of 42 selected items on a four point…

Computers have taken an important place in the training of science students and in the professional life of scientists. It is often taken for granted that most students have mastered basic Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) skills; however, it has been shown that not all students are equally proficient in this regard. Starting from…

This quasi-experimental study examined the relationship between students' metacognitive awareness and willingness to read English medical texts. So, a model was proposed and tested using structural equation modeling (SEM) with R software. Participants included 98 medical students of two classes. One class was assigned as the control group and the…

This study compared student engagement and achievement levels between students enrolled in a traditional college algebra lecture course and students enrolled in a "flipped" course. Results showed that students in the flipped class had consistently higher levels of achievement throughout the course than did students in the traditional…

In this longitudinal study, we tested whether the association between oppositional defiance to parental authority (i.e., adolescents' tendency to bluntly reject parental rules) and autonomy would depend upon the specific conceptualization of autonomy. Whereas oppositional defiance would yield more interpersonal distance from parents, because…

Web-based problem-solving, a compound ability of critical thinking, creative thinking, reasoning thinking and information-searching abilities, has been recognised as an important competence for elementary school students. Some researchers have reported the possible correlations between problem-solving competence and information searching ability;…

Conceptual differences between self-efficacy and ability self-estimate scores, used in vocational psychology and career counseling, were examined with confirmatory factor analysis, discriminate relations, and reliability analysis. Results suggest that empirical differences may be due to measurement error or scale content, rather than due to the…

Mindfulness, an ancient spiritual practice, is becoming an increasingly popular component of communication courses, training individuals to reserve judgment in their dealings with others. However, the effects of mindfulness in communication courses are not well researched. We compared students taking an introductory communication course that…

The purpose of the study reported on in this paper was to identify and compare instructors' and students' perceptions of Team-Based Learning (TBL). Participants were 270 instructors and 288 fourth year students from the faculties of Industrial Education at six universities in Bangkok. The data were analyzed using factor analysis and structural…