This document includes reports on four subjects relevant to planned and unplanned aspects of occupational choices by youth. (1) "Toward a Morphology of Occupational Choice," by Robert A. Ellis and others, discusses intrinsic features and extrinsic rewards of work, extra-role considerations, and goal perception as major influences on occupational…

Two sociometric techniques were used in Project PRIME (Programmed Re-Entry Into Mainstream Education) to elicit data from peers about the behavior of selected normal and handicapped children in each of the 500 plus classrooms studied. One of these instruments was called Guess Who. The Guess Who instrument consists of 29 questions, such as,…

The development of psychological methods for assessing the abilities of deaf students could aid in the formation of educational programs and the provision of vocational guidance. A battery of tests designed to measure a wide range of functions was administered to all eighth grade students, average age 15, in schools for the deaf in Sweden. All…

In the analysis of ability structure and loss of vision, 228 blind persons (153 male, 75 female) heterogenous in respect to chronological age, sex, degree of blindness, age at onset, and duration, were compared to sighted controls. A test battery was administered which included tests for verbal comprehension, mental arithmetic, spatial ability,…

The purpose of this study was to determine whether option weighting improved the internal consistency and intercorrelation of the subtests. The differential option-weighting scheme employed in this study is based on one devised by Guttman. The tests were first scored with Guttman-type weights and then with conventional correction-for-guessing…

This summarizes a study designed to provide a basis for researchers who study measurable areas of human performance or attempt to conceptualize and develop a theory and structure of abilities. Specifically, this study was directed toward the identification of tests that can serve as markers for well established cognitive factors. (Author/CTM)

Factor analysis was used to determine whether computerized patient management problems had the same factor structure as multiple choice examinations and rating scales. It was determined that the factor structure was similar to the examinations but not the rating scale. (JKS)

Explores academic self-efficacy of 382 male and 319 female Chapter 1 elementary school students using the Self-Efficacy for Academic Tasks scale. Factor analyses reveal no sex differences in factor structure. Verbal skills and compliance explain 66 percent of the covariation. Efficacy beliefs decline between second and fifth grades. (SLD)

Relative fits of 3 factor-structure models of adolescent reckless behavior were examined using the 10-item Reckless Behavior Questionnaire with 1,357 college and 181 high school students. Both one- and two-factor models were found to be satisfactory representations. Implications of a study of construct validity are discussed. (SLD)

Planning is essential to creating safe schools and it is required by the Federal No Child Left Behind legislation (U.S. Department of Education, 2004) and implemented via district local education action plans. The implementation of these plans involves continuous monitoring and reevaluation of information pertinent to each campus. As such, this…

According to the literature, affective work competencies and personal-social competencies are but two of the terminologies among the plethora of captions employed to describe the set of behaviors commonly referred to as work ethics. The commonality linking these various captions is that all terminologies relate to the concepts of individual…

The Standardized Letter of Recommendation (SLR), a 28-item form, was created by ETS to supplement the qualitative rating of graduate school applicants' nonacademic qualities with a quantitative approach. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the following psychometric properties of the SLR using the Rasch rating-scale model: dimensionality,…

This study represents the first to empirically validate the structure of social self-concept (SC) as proposed by the Shavelson model. For each of three age groups--preadolescents (252 3rd graders), early adolescents (290 7th graders), and late adolescents (335 11th graders)--analyses of covariance structures were used to test: (1) that social SC…

Conceptions of principal change facilitator style (PCFS) and bureaucratic and professional role orientations (BPROs) are used to explore the construct of teacher receptivity to change (TRC) and the relationships among teacher perceptions of PCFS and their perceptions of receptivity to change. Part I of the study analyzed and refined the…

The cognitive structure of an algebra test was defined and validated using the linear test model (LLTM) and quadratic assignment (QA) techniques. The LLTM is an extension of the Rasch model with a linear constraint that describes item difficulty in terms of the cognitive operations required to solve the item. The model permits the specification of…