Study funded by the Exploratory Committee for Assessing the Progress of Education (ECAPE).

In the first experiment, 16 kindergarten children were tested on vertical/horizontal and oblique discriminations in symmetrical and asymmetrical alignments. When stimuli were asymmetrically aligned, the former discrimination was learned as rapidly as the latter. The second experiment demonstrated that the influence of configurational cues in…

Thirteen primary teachers provided information on 321 students concerning the students' temperament characteristics, school performance estimates, and classroom management decisions. Factor analysis of the temperament measures yielded three independent factors: Task Orientation, Adaptability, and Reactivity. A strong and consistent relationship…

Examined the effects of situational constraints and goal setting on job performance and satisfaction in a sample of 120 college students. Results indicated a relationship between task performance and goal difficulty only in the absence of severe situational constraints. Self-set goal level was also associated with performance. (JAC)

Describes a process that measures the varying performance of county mental health systems in achieving goals. Performance and relative need are then used to make differential allocation of state funds for services. The process reinforces attempts to meet goals, and has lowered the gap in per capita funding. (Author/JAC)

To evaluate the effects of drinking glucose and fructose before prolonged exercise, six female runners were given glucose, fructose, saccharin, or plain water to drink before running to exhaustion. Metabolic processes were monitored. The best performance came from those drinking water alone. Fructose seemed preferable to glucose, however.…

In an attempt to identify physiological factors that account for success in distance running, researchers evaluated relationships among ventilatory threshold, running economy, and distance running performance. Subjects were trained male runners with similar maximal aerobic power. (Authors/PP)

Forty-two searchers with varying degrees of experience in searching online bibliographic retrieval systems queried the ERIC database using DIALOG. The results were measured with variables which related to the search outcome (cost effectiveness, precision, and recall) and the search process. (JJD)

The differential performance of boys and girls on selected measures of impulse control was examined. No differences were shown between morning and afternoon groups on two Tuesdays. Girls manifested circadian effects more, made fewer delayed-reward choices, and made less accurate time estimations. (Author/CM)