The program evaluation standards approved by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) in 1994 that deal with reliability and validity accurately represent contemporary views of the psychometric community with regard to reliability and validity. As such, these standards move the field forward. The ANSI standards recognize that reliability…

This practicum report was designed to enhance supervision of social work through the development and utilization of a resource directory. A pilot agency, located in an ethnically diverse, metropolitan community, was provided the directory in an attempt to positively influence the implementation of the supervision recommendations. The agency then…

The correlation coefficient is an integral part of many other statistical techniques (analysis of variance, t-tests, etc.), since all analytic methods are actually correlational (G. V. Glass and K. D. Hopkins, 1984). The correlation coefficient is a statistical summary that represents the degree and direction of relationship between two variables.…

Cross-validation, an economical method for assessing whether sample results will generalize, is discussed in this paper. Cross-validation is an invariance technique that uses two subsets of the data sample to derive discriminant function coefficients. The two sets of coefficients are then used with each data subset to derive discriminant function…

The educational audit is suggested for assessing the process of inquiry for reliability and the product of inquiry for absence of bias. The inquiry auditor must review the inquiry processes to determine that they conform to norms of "good professional practice." He must review inquiry products to ensure they can be substantiated from…

This paper was written to help local level advocates in the human services understand and use statistical data from the U.S. Bureau of the Census. Because of budget cuts, difficult times are ahead for human services delivery. Advocates need to strengthen their technical skills. In the first section of the paper, two new programs of published data…

A study was conducted on the measurement of the characteristics of innovation. The results or specific recommendations of evaluation studies may be assessed for their likelihood of adoption and implementation based on these characteristics. As the recommendations are perceived more positively, the level of utilization should increase. The semantic…

A study was initiated by a university rhetoric department to investigate the reliability of methods of rating student themes written as prerequisites for course exemptions. Ten experienced raters were selected to rate the beginning, middle, and ending paragraphs of 30 previously scored exemption themes that represented a range of achievement.…

This study reports the interrater agreement of the Maternal Language Classification Scale (MLCS), a functional language classification system, developed partly to avoid problems identified with previous scales. The MLCS is a comprehensive system for classifying the functional content of maternal language addressed to children whose mean length of…

The object of this study was to validate a technique for establishing inter-rater reliability on the Southwestern Cooperative Interaction Observation Schedule (SCIOS), where it was impractical to bring the observers to a common site. Reliability was originally obtained when eight observers met together. Observers were divided into four pairs. A…

Two studies were reported which attempted to estimate the stability and construct validity of human salivary response as a measure of individual differences (IDs) in physiological arousal. Twenty-second base line estimates and 20-second response levels to four drops of lemon juice were measured, with the former value being removed from the latter…

A brief and simple guide discusses the place and purpose of coding experimental data in the research process. The trade-offs involved unitizing data are reviewed; it is noted that a decision that increases reliability may reduce the validity of results, but without reliability there will be no validity at all. A discussion of categorizing data…

This paper is written to propose and describe a set of four criteria for the empirical evaluation of psychiatric classification. (Author)

Describes the biomotometer and reports a reliability and a validity study of the instrument. (SB)