The report documents activities of the 3-year (1986-1989) Assessment as Intervention Project at George Washington University (District of Columbia). Major activities of the project included: data collection with 25 families of newborn at-risk premature infants, including assessment-intervention sessions at 3, 6, 9, and 12 months of age; data…

The observation manual provides a system for the naturalistic observation of interactions between the preschool child and the caregiver. It can be used in research with the preschool aged child and the parent or teacher in home, laboratory, or school settings. The behavior categories included are applicable for collecting frequency data or…

Using a naturalistic inquiry approach, a study examined the application of whole class instruction as an alternative instructional strategy to ability grouping in first grade reading instruction. Subjects, 57 first-grade students in two classrooms attending an elementary school in a middle-class section of Orem, Utah, used the Companion Reading…

A study explored how young adults view influences on their own conflict behavior: what examples had an impact on them and how; and what modeled strategies and tactics were available to them. Subjects, 172 undergraduates (119 females and 53 males), described in writing a conflict from their past which had a great impact on them in terms of how they…

A response to Richard E. Clark's conclusion that media research needs to stop emphasizing descriptive research and focus on prescriptive research designs and questions, this paper reiterates the distinctions between disciplines and applied fields of study, and suggests that these distinctions should be evident in the descriptive/prescriptive…

Egon G. Guba and Yvonna S. Lincoln were among the first to develop a set of extensive criteria for establishing naturalistic inquiry as a disciplined research methodology. The naturalistic paradigm--also called post-positivist, ethnographic, phenomenological, and qualitative--has gained acceptance as a legitimate alternative to the previously…

This study examined the relationships among reading activities, rules for pupil participation, student engagement, and subsequent student achievement in reading lessons taught by student teachers (ST) and experienced teachers (ET). Two ST/ET dyads were observed and interviewed while they instructed third and fourth grade pupils in reading. The…

Architectural considerations and recommendations to facilitate the work of an Educational Research Center for Child Development are presented. The purposes of the center are to demonstrate model programs for children, train student and child development professionals, and facilitate and disseminate research on young children. Program…

This study investigated the relationship between peer relations and help-seeking behavior. Seventy-four subjects, predominately black boys and girls, were drawn from the third and fifth grades. A roster-rating sociometric scale was used to obtain measures of children's perceived academic competence, desirability as a helper, and friendship status…

This naturalistic study provides a description and analysis of the processes through which 26 kindergarten students and a particular male student, called Lester, defined rules of social acceptability which stigmatized Lester as an "outsider." Findings are primarily based on 112 hours of recorded peer interaction and interviews conducted…

This monograph addresses the issues in phenomenology as applied to educational research. The first chapter discusses problems with the following traditional goals of scientific methodology when applied by social scientists to educational research: measurement, control, objectivity, generalizability, and prediction. The second chapter explains the…

Prior to the adoption of a Restrictive Procedures Guidelines Draft, baseline measures on the use of restrictive procedures were collected by observing selected retarded adult clients (N=13) in seven pre-selected settings (group homes or vocational shops) of the Vocational and Rehabilitation Research Institute (VRRI) in Calgary, Alberta. An…

Both the popular and professional literatures commonly suggest that the more involvement by fathers in their infants' routine care the better. However, empirical support for this position is far from conclusive. Although several researchers have reported a positive relationship between father involvement and father-infant relations, others have…

This study was intended to examine: (1) the kinds of conflict preschool children between 2 and 5 years of age become involved in; (2) the methods children use in dealing with such conflicts; (3) the outcomes of the conflicts; and (4) differences in behavior according to age and gender of children. Recorded were random samples of conflict…

This paper introduces a research series recently initiated to begin to describe and interpret curriculum as practiced and experienced at the classroom and individual student levels. Curriculum is defined as whatever a student learns. A multi-year series of studies is planned to combine naturalistic and survey methods to generate theories about how…