A study was conducted to determine whether there is an identifiable coping personality related to academic achievement and retention for black college students. Low coping students were also taught coping strategies to determine whether mastering academic requirements facilitates achievement and persistence. The relationship of black student…

Locus of control, a generalized belief about causality in one's personal life, was identified as a potential variable impinging upon the acquisition of science-related attitudes in classes of high school students from 10th grade biology, and 11th and 12th grade chemistry, and of college elementary education majors. Correlations of the…

The relationships between teachers' attitudes toward responsibility and locus of control and other characteristics such as stress, educational attitudes, and attitudes toward change were studied in 54 (35 female and 19 male) experienced primary and secondary school teachers taking a course on classroom-based research. Attitude toward…

Approximately 700 Mexican American and Anglo students in grades 9, 10, and 11, who were identified as having superior mathematical ability, were surveyed to identify the factors affecting mathematics participation, determine the relative importance of these factors, and determine their stability over time. Five variables were studied: cognitive…

A study to determine teachers' attitudes toward inservice education programs was conducted in relation to the RISE (Regional In Service Education) Teacher Center (Connecticut), which provided two types of service: mandated inservice programs for participating schools, and voluntary professional development programs. Data for the study were…

Inservice programs that are likely to accomplish their objectives are characterized by: (1) differentiated training experiences; (2) teachers in active roles; (3) an emphasis on demonstration, supervised trials, and feedback; (4) sharing and mutual assistance; (5) activities linked to a general effort of the school; (6) teachers who choose goals…

All nine administrators at Los Angeles Southwest College (LASC) were surveyed to determine their political, social, and psychological background. Three separate instruments focused on leadership style, need for authority, and locus of control. Comparisons were made to determine the extent to which leadership styles were similar and to discover…

The development and validation of the Multidimensional-Multiattributional Causality Scales (MMCS) are described. The scales are distinctive because they measure locus of control specific to two goals--achievement and affiliation. Half of the items concern success, and half concern failure experiences. Results of four validity studies with under…

This study of Piagetian formal reasoning in seventh grade students reports the relationships between four aspects of the ability to control variables in an experiment and the relationships between those four aspects and other constructs. The four aspects of the ability to control variables identified are: (1) set up a controlled experiment, (2)…

Life Lab, an alternative educational program stressing self-directed learning at Miami-Dade Community College, is discussed in terms of its development, impact, and student attributes. More than half of the document presents personal histories and opinions of students and staff, alternating with the views of Dr. MacGregor Smith, program founder.…

This segment of the national evaluation study of the Follow Through Planned Variation Model presents an analysis of the longitudinal effects of Follow Through program models and a study of Follow Through children who were identified as being at academic risk. The longitudinal analysis examines three dimensions of program effects: (1) differences…

National studies indicate that remedial or developmental programs in the community college have generally been unsuccessful, resulting in inordinately high attrition rates among nontraditional, low-achieving students. A more appropriate system is individual, learner-oriented instruction. The attempt is to shift the students' orientation from…

A technique was developed to facilitate creating computer-based instruction (CBI) with a minimum of effort on the part of the author/coder, and the feasibility of using a structure which puts control of the lesson strategy into the hands of the student learner was investigated. A model which relieves the author of CBI strategy selection was…

Both papers are concerned with locus of control (of reinforcement) expectancies among young children, especially preschoolers. The first reviews a number of studies which examined the relationship between locus of control, socioeconomic status, and ethnicity. The results indicate that (1) economic status is consistently related to locus of…

Sketches the outlines of a life-span perspective on competence development, which focuses on beliefs about one's potential for producing desirable outcomes. The concern is with the nature and implications of individual differences in perceptions of personal agency and likely origins and development of the perceptions in the early years. (Author/BB)