The detection of differential item functioning (DIF) is important in psychological and behavioral sciences. Standard DIF detection methods perform an item-by-item test iteratively, often assuming that all items except the one under investigation are DIF-free. This article proposes a Bayesian adaptive Lasso method to detect DIF in graded response…

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused significant disruption in education. We employ a gravity model to estimate its impact on international student credit mobility. Data on inbound and outbound students to and from four Spanish universities between the academic years 2017-2018 and 2021-2022 are used. While COVID-19 significantly reduced participation…

Emerging youth movements to promote issues reflected in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are celebrated as critical for the future attainment of societal aims. We explore the possibility for institutions of higher education to serve as an intentional "third space" to engender the creation and mobilization of…

This dissertation includes three individual articles that explore the relationship between witnessing bullying and defending behavior among students who are bystanders of bullying. Chapter One provides the rationale and purpose of this dissertation and an overview of the three articles that comprise it. Chapter Two employed a cross-sectional…

Despite limiting access to applicants from underrepresented racial and ethnic groups, the practice of using hard or soft Graduate Record Examination (GRE) cutoff scores in physics graduate program admissions is still a popular method for reducing the pool of applicants. The present study considers whether the undergraduate institutions of…

Background: Relational victimization (RV) is a significant threat to adolescent mental health and social adaptation in China. However, its developmental characteristics during the school transition period are poorly understood. Finkelhor's developmental victimology framework provides a comprehensive lens to explore factors influencing RV's…

This study shows that residual variation can cause problems related to scaling in exponential random graph models (ERGM). Residual variation is likely to exist when there are unmeasured variables in a model--even those uncorrelated with other predictors--or when the logistic form of the model is inappropriate. As a consequence, coefficients cannot…

The Major Field Test in Business (MFTB) is a nationally administered student evaluation that measures the accumulated knowledge of undergraduates enrolled in a four-year degree program. Research to date has focused primarily on understanding how different variables correlate with performance on this standardized test -- such as student grades,…

Purpose: We aim to identify the most accurate model for predicting adolescent (Grade 9) reading difficulties (RD) in reading fluency and reading comprehension using 17 kindergarten-age variables. Three models (neural networks, linear, and mixture) were compared based on their accuracy in predicting RD. We also examined whether the same or a…

Much research shows academic self-concept and achievement are reciprocally related over time, based on traditional longitudinal data cross-lag-panel models (CLPM) supporting a reciprocal effects model (REM). However, recent research has challenged CLPM's appropriateness, arguing that CLPMs with random intercepts (RI-CLPMs) provide a more robust…

The career adaptation model helps to explain the process of transitioning from university to employment among college students. This study tested the invariance of the model for gender and for Portuguese and Brazilian cultural contexts. Participants included 638 students (69% women, 66.1% Brazilian), aged 18 to 56 (M = 23.78, SD = 20.33).…

Despite the important role assigned to analogical reasoning (AR) in cognition and language, the relationship between this ability and language skills in the emergent literacy period has not been sufficiently studied, especially in Spanish speakers. To explore this link, we examined two modalities of AR (verbal and non-verbal) as predictors of…

Using cross-sectional data from 504 students from four Kenyan universities, this study evaluates the indirect effect of brand personality on the relationship between social media and students' behavioral intentions to enroll in postgraduate studies. Additionally, the study examines the moderating effect of attitude on the relationship between…

The goal of this article was to examine gender-typed behavior longitudinally and to consider its relationship with sexual orientation in adulthood. Data were from 10,624 respondents who completed Wave 1 (adolescence), Wave 3 (emerging adulthood), and Wave 4 (early adulthood) of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health. First,…

As a follow-up study to a cross-sectional national study that established the linkage between gender as well as family factors and the likelihood of being Taiwanese adolescent readers, this study attempted to utilize the same data set with longitudinal data to explore whether the association between family factors and being an avid adolescent…