Attitude measures frequently produce distributions of item scores that attenuate interitem correlations and thus also distort findings regarding the factor structure underlying the items. An actual data set involving 260 adult subjects' responses to 55 items on the Love Relationships Scale is employed to illustrate empirical methods for…

With the advent of profiling and maintaining records of achievement, the assessment of the affective characteristics of pupils has become an issue of general concern in England. The Scottish Council for Research in Education has been involved in programs investigating the assessment of individuals and the evaluation of curricula. Teachers can…

Despite the growth of non-credit programs and the increase in numbers of part-time students and part-time teachers, little research has been conducted that provides data about part-time teachers and their motivations for teaching. A two-phased study was conducted to group reasons for teaching into meaningful, empirically based categories and to…

The general goal of this paper is to help researchers conduct appropriately designed goodness of fit studies for item response model applications. The specific purposes are to describe: (1) an up-to-date set of promising and useful methods for addressing a variety of goodness of fit questions; and (2) current research studies to advance this set…

This study replicates and elaborates a three-dimensional, spherical model that integrates research findings concerning social and emotional behavior, psychopathology, and academic competence. Kindergarten teachers completed an extensive set of rating scales on 100 children, including the Classroom Behavior Inventory and the Child Adaptive Behavior…

This paper reports on a short version of the Student Jenkins Activity Survey (JAS), a multiple choice questionnaire that measures Type A "coronary-prone" behavior in assessing subjects' A/B types. The primary objective was to determine if the short and long forms of the student JAS represent similar measurement instruments. A secondary…

The validity of the Secondary School Improvement Program Effective Schools Survey (SSIPESS) was studied, which is based on the Santa Clara County School Effectiveness Program. The SSIPESS, designed for the secondary school level, is an 85-item survey designed for teachers; and it varies from a three- to five-point scale, with eight underlying…

This study assessed level and structure differences across sex and ethnic groups on a newly developed multiple aptitude battery, called the Ball Aptitude Battery (BAB), and established and examined the concurrent and differential validities of the battery relative to different groups. The 17 Ball ability variables are: clerical test; idea fluency;…

To supplement previous reliability and validity studies concerning the Noncognitive Questionnaire (NCQ), new NCQ items were written and assessed in relation to the original eight NCQ scales. The NCQ measures eight non-traditional or non-cognitive variables that relate to minority student retention--positive self-concept, realistic self-appraisal,…

The instrument designed by Patricia Kearney to measure communication style was chosen for a study of validity and reliability for three reasons: (1) the format of the instrument appeared to be more descriptive than evaluative, (2) its theoretical foundations encouraged the viewpoint that there is no one best communication style, and (3) it was…

Statistical methods employed to test individual differences in dual-task performance and the existence of a general time-sharing ability are reviewed and critiqued. Specifically, both the types of data being collected and the types of data analysis procedures have been inadequate to the critical evaluation of a hypothetical…

A procedure for assessing content-area and total-test dimensionality which uses response function discrepancies (RFD) was studied. Three different versions of the RFD procedure were compared to Bejar's principal axis content-area procedure and Indow and Samejima's exploratory factor analytic technique. The procedures were compared in terms of the…

The TESTFACT computer program and full-information factor analysis of test items were used in a computer simulation conducted to correct for the guessing effect. Full-information factor analysis also corrects for omitted items. The present version of TESTFACT handles up to five factors and 150 items. A preliminary smoothing of the tetrachoric…

The relationship between a teacher's attitude and the environment of his or her class was examined. The research was designed to determine the effects of the learning environment on the academic achievements of students. This research measured teacher attitudes with the Minnesota Teacher Attitude Inventory (MTAI). Students' perceptions of the…

The complex nature of the psychological construct called judgment, the history of its identification as a mental ability, its measurement, and its relationship to other mental abilities are discussed. Factor analytic research which isolated the judgment factor is reviewed. The pervasiveness of the judgment factor throughout a number of diverse…