This study was conducted to evaluate whether the adjectival self-description checklist may provide a viable method of quickly obtaining initial personality type information. The Personal Preferences Self-Description Questionnaire (PPDSQ) was administered to more than 420 college students, and data were analyzed using classical reliability analysis…

Interviews with children about their knowledge of a set of words was used to examine the concurrent validity of three paper-and-pencil measures of knowledge of these words--a standardized vocabulary test and two experimenter-designed tests. One experimenter-designed test, the Levels test, had three multiple-choice items per word that targeted…

A study expands on an earlier study by developing a prototypical evaluation instrument for directors of forensics. A 3-part questionnaire was constructed to assess the reliability and validity of the instrument used in the earlier study. Questionnaires were returned by 63 of 205 directors of forensics programs representing both public and private…

This digest offers principles of performance assessment as an alternative to norm-referenced tests. The definition of performance assessment developed by the U.S. Congress's Office of Technology and Assessment is given, common features are listed, and the terms "performance" and "authentic" are defined. Suggested guidelines for…

The L statistic of E. B. Page (1963) tests the agreement of a single group of judges with an a priori ordering of alternative treatments. This paper extends the two group test of D. W. Leitner and C. M. Dayton (1976), an extension of the L test, to analyze difference in consensus between two unequally sized groups of judges. Exact critical values…

The Test of Phonological Awareness (TOPA) was developed to help identify children who are delayed in their development of phonological awareness. Research supports the theory that children with poor phonological awareness are at risk of later reading difficulties. Children who score in the bottom quartile of the TOPA are considered to be at risk…

This study was conducted with three purposes in mind: (1) to determine the utility of the Colwell Music Achievement Test 3 (MAT3) as an instrument for measuring student instrumental music achievement; (2) to determine the types of musical achievement exhibited by students in Tennessee's secondary music programs; and (3) to determine the utility of…

Although videotape is the preferred method for recording behavior, there are many natural settings in which it is impractical or too intrusive. The ability to collect data in such settings and in real time has been enhanced by the advent of light, powerful laptop computers. This poster (with paper) describes a set of eight programs (developed in…

Modified Parallel Analysis (MPA) is a heuristic method for assessing "approximate unidimensionality" of item pools. It compares the second eigenvalue of the observed correlation matrix with the corresponding eigenvalue extracted from a "parallel" matrix generated by a unidimensional and locally independent model. Revised…

A study examined classroom teachers' and remedial reading teachers' perceptions and knowledge about assessment of disabled readers. Surveys were returned by 198 teachers chosen randomly from the membership roll of the International Reading Association. Twenty-nine nonrespondents were contacted by phone and responded orally: no significant…

The psychometric objections to using essays and other subjective tests for measurement can be overcome by a many-facet Rasch model. This model enables judge-awarded grades to be transformed from their arbitrary, local, non-linear rating scale form into linear measures with explicit generalizable meaning of specifiable reliability (standard error)…

The extent to which students' ratings of teacher performance in mathematics courses are reliable, valid, and unbiased was investigated. Data on 746 courses by 52 faculty members over a 4-year period were used in a multiple regression analysis. It was found that students gave higher evaluations to faculty members when the students had previously…

Reported are results of three studies: (1) Hand Preference Consistency during Infancy and Preschool Years (K. Bathurst and A. W. Gottfried), (2) Asymmetry of Verbal Processing: Influence of Family Handedness (K. Bathurst and D. W. Kee), (3) Consistency of Hand Preference and Cognitive Development in Young Children (K. Bathurst and A. W.…

In order to address the issue of the reliability and possible bias of students' evaluation of the performance of college teachers, an unobtrusive indicator of teacher performance was investigated. The indicator was the degree to which teachers develop a following among students, measured by how often students return to teachers for additional…

Traditionally, coping and adaptation have been considered synonymous in individual's responses to illness and other stressful situations. The Illness Adaptation Scale (IAS) is a 12-item instrument which was designed to assess adaptational outcomes in illness situations as well as four coping modes (instrumental-self oriented, instrumental-other…