When learning is taking place, students test their hypotheses and evaluate them, and modify their current theories on the basis of new information. This phenomenon is known as "hypothesis testing view" or "theory changes." Many students change their rules to another while they are taking a test. This study introduced a new…

Dissertations are the cumulative, tangible "best evidence" of interests of doctoral faculty and students in serious and incisive scholarship. Thus, dissertations are thoroughly studied by the program review teams periodically hired by boards of higher education in most states. The present paper explores seven errors in quantitative…

Baumrind (1971) proposed three distinct patterns of parental authority (permissiveness, authoritarianism, and authoritativeness) and measured these parenting styles through interviews with parents and their children and through observations of parents interacting with their children. This study was undertaken to develop a readily-accessible,…

A theoretical framework for incorporating item response theory into the measurement of attitude and other personality processes is presented. The person by item model is introduced by considering the conceptual usefulness of such a model in understanding item responding, outlining the form of the model, briefly discussing methods for examining the…

Optimal appropriateness indices, recently introduced by Levine and Drasgow (1984), provide the highest rates of detection of aberrant response patterns that can be obtained from item responses. These optimal appropriateness indices are used to study three important problems in appropriateness measurement. First, the maximum detection rates of two…

The thesis of this paper is that the decision to use one of three approaches to unit-of-analysis in educational research should be based on substantive considerations, not statistical factors. In addition to the commonly used "total analysis" (regression analysis across individuals), the within and between analyses are inherent in the…

A detailed description of five latent structure models of achievement measurement is presented. The first project paper, by David L. McArthur, analyzes the history of mental testing to show how conventional item analysis procedures were developed, and how dissatisfaction with them has led to fragmentation. The range of distinct conceptual and…

Research on moral development and behavior has traditionally emphasized person related variables such as level or stage of moral reasoning, individual differences in moral traits and dispositions, or past reinforcement history. The effects of context on moral action and decision, in contrast, have received relatively little attention. It is…

The College Board's Spanish Listening-Reading Test, designed to measure student ability and knowledge, is required of all students with previous knowledge of Spanish, however acquired, who have no college credit in Spanish and who intend to enroll in University of Texas, Austin, Spanish course. With satisfactory performance on the test, eligible…

The reciprocal relationship between self concept and academic achievement was investigated using a two-wave, two-variable, multiple-indicator design. The Self Observation Scales (SOS) and Stanford Achievement Test (SAT) were used to measure self concept and academic achievement, respectively. A sample of second grade children and their families…

There have been many attempts to formulate a procedure for extracting information from incorrect responses to multiple choice items, i.e., the assessment of partial knowledge. The results of these attempts can be described as inconsistent at best. It is hypothesized that these inconsistencies arise from three methodological problems: the…

A sample of 234 fifth- and 259 sixth-grade students scaled the items of the Piers-Harris, Tennessee, Coopersmith, and Lipsett self-concept measures. The scaling of the Piers-Harris and the Tennessee inventories was examined in reference to their subscales. The present technique placed items on a bivariate plane of two orthogonal dimensions…

This speech addresses the "What,""Why," and "How" of Brazelton Neonatal Assessment Training for school psychologists. "What" concerns the Brazelton Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale, its administration, and what it assesses. Based on the best performance, the infant's score on this scale is scored in the…

Argues that there is room for both those tests that focus on stable between-individual gains, and discusses how to evaluate a test along both the psychometric and edumetric dimensions. (Author/JM)

One of the major responsibilities of school psychologists is assessment, one goal of which is to provide services for children who need assistance in meeting the demands of the student role. Mercer (1977) points out that the student role includes two dimensions (social and cognitive), that student success depends upon progress in both dimensions,…