The Teacher's Report Form (TRF) was investigated over 3 years for its practical ability to track outcomes in 89 elementary students with emotional disturbances. The students whose placement changed to less restrictive settings demonstrated significant improvement on consecutive TRF's in academic performance, classroom functioning, and aggressive…

A study assessed the usefulness of three measures of self-esteem in 72 British individuals (ages 17-24) with Down syndrome. Internal consistency estimates were high, but validity was only demonstrated for the Self-Perception Profile for Learning Disabled Students, supporting its use with individuals with verbal mental ages of around 7 years.…

Study seeks to develop a valid, reliable measure of lifetime religious and spiritual experience and to assess its value in explaining late-life health. Discusses the development of the Spiritual History Scale, a 23-item four-dimensional, retrospective summary measure of religious and spiritual practices and attributions over the life course.…

Examines how data from student self-report surveys and other sources can be used to assess the weaknesses in current school iincidentreporting systems and improve the validity of surveillance data on school violence. Assesses the validity of data from Gun-Free Schools Act reports on the number of guns in school in light of nationally…

A multiple problem single-subject design replicated across 4 youth (ages 10-14) with disabilities was employed to assess participants' achievement of objectives associated with Og, a computerized leisure education program. Results indicate that there was support for the social validity of the intervention and similar leisure education computerized…

Presents a general discussion of the conceptual and operational limitations found within the existing efforts to assess constructs central to the study of parents. The discussion is followed by a review and critique of measures designed to assess concepts central to research on parents. Includes recommendations to improve the quality of measures.…

Analyzes simulated performance ratings on a six-point scale by two independent raters to account for nonsystematic error in performance ratings. Results suggest that rater agreement or covariance is not always a dependable estimate of score reliability and that the practice of seeking additional raters for adjudication of discrepant ratings is not…

Three children with autism who used facilitated communication were given sentence completion statements in which correct responses were either known or unknown to the facilitator. Responses were evaluated in relation to form accuracy (spelling) and content accuracy (correctness of answer). Results strongly suggest that the content of responses was…

Questions concerning school psychology services for children of diverse ethnic groups have related to problem identification, acceptability of interventions, the efficacy of special programs and interventions and the preparation of professionals to deal with multicultural and cross-cultural practice. Reviews models of ethnic validity and examines…

Investigates the general factor and uniqueness characteristics of the individual tests of the Woodcock-Johnson Test of Cognitive Ability-Revised (WJTCA-R). Only 2 of the 19 WJTCA-R tests examined had low general factor loadings, while 2 had low uniqueness. All other tests had medium or high uniqueness. Discusses implications for clinical…

Examines the performance characteristics of 83 school-identified learning-disabled children on the Differential Ability Scales. Sixty percent showed a significant standard score discrepancy between the General Conceptual Ability and at least one achievement test. Implications regarding the educational diagnostic and intervention processes…

This paper presents results of analyses of a questionnaire constructed for parents to detect student motivational problems and behavior patterns which may suggest an attention deficit disorder. Cross tabulations and analyses of variance demonstrated the scale's power to identify children with attention deficits. (DB)

Concerns about and objections to competency-based assessment in higher education are examined, including superficiality, use of inference, neglect of knowledge and of process, and subjectivity. It is concluded that, although each objection raises an important issue, in each case, a well-designed competency-based assessment system can overcome…

Examines whether fear of therapy and psychological distress were predictive of help-seeking. A nonclinical student sample (n=263) completed measures of their treatment fears, expectations, anxiety, psychological distress and help-seeking likelihood. Concerns about image, stigma, coercion, and psychological distress were all related to help-seeking…

Explores the use of quantitative EEG in the detection of lies employing a special electrode cap and specialized video recording and audio equipment. The method offers the ability to decide when it can predict accurately and when it can predict with 100% accuracy. (JPS)