A brief overview of the status, as of August 1990, of the 1990 decennial census conducted by the U.S. Department of Commerce is presented. Topics include: the recanvassing effort for following up on the census proper; the effects of reinstitution of unemployment benefits for all temporary census employees; completion of the initial interviewing…

A study examined interns, communications corporations, and sponsoring universities to see if there was a "win-win-win" relationship occurring among these three partners. The two-part investigation first involved interviewing 37 past interns, on-site supervisors, and campus coordinators, and second, involved sending out a nationwide questionnaire…

The purpose of this two-phase study, guided by the theory and method of interpretive interactionism, is to describe how family day care providers perceive and implement their caregiving intentions and practices. In phase 1 of the study, data were obtained from interviews with 31 providers and in phase 2, observations of 6 providers over a 10-month…

The purpose of the study reported in this paper was to identify support systems for supervisors of people with moderate special needs (MSN) in training internships and employment situations. A questionnaire was mailed to 105 cooperating practitioners who had served in previous years as on-site supervisors (ONS) for students in a job…

A study examined parental perceptions of young children's literacy development and explored the relationship between parental literacy level and perceptions of the importance of literacy artifacts and events/experiences in preschoolers' literacy development. Subjects, 108 parents of beginning kindergartners, were interviewed and given a test of…

To avoid the costs to the college and its students of making a poor hiring decision, Edison State Community College in Ohio uses the techniques of descriptive interviewing and teaching simulations to select new faculty. In descriptive interviewing, questions focus on how the candidate has actually behaved in real situations rather than on vague…

For those involved in research of any type, the gathering of complete, relevant, and untainted information is the ultimate goal. The collection of valuable information is particularly challenging in the social sciences, which often call for qualitative field research. The effective field research interviewer must not only be knowledgeable of the…

This pilot study explored teacher characteristics as they influenced the use of "Exploring Nepal," a cognitive learning-based interactive video system for middle school students. Specifically, the study sought to narrow down a variety of teacher characteristics that may influence the quality of their interaction with the videodisk. The…

Research on perceived locus of control indicates that there is a positive correlation between internal locus of control and a variety of cognitive behaviors associated with academic achievement, that the perceived locus of control of educationally disadvantaged students is more external than average, and that the perceived locus of control of such…

This paper is based on data collected from New York City's Computer Pilot Program, an on-going investigation of the use of comprehensive computer based instruction (CBI) programs in the basic skills remediation of educationally disadvantaged students in grades 3-12. The findings suggest that the use of comprehensive CBI is altering the ways in…

This report summarizes the results of the 1985 Higher Education Utilization Study (HEUS-85), which provides current estimates of the availability, use, and support of instructional telecommunications technologies--video, audio, and computers--in the nation's colleges and universities, and describes the availability and use patterns of these…

A multi-method approach involving observations, interviews, and parental self-reports of family behavior, was developed to investigate the parenting behaviors of mothers who either had been or had not been sexually abused in their families when children. Of the 20 families with mothers who had been abused, 10 were two-parent and 10 were…

A study of the reliability of the proficiency ratings scale and techniques used by three federal government agencies--the Central Intelligence Agency, the Defense Language Institute, and the Foreign Service Institute (FSI)--to test employees' oral language proficiency in French and German had two randomly selected two-person teams of testers from…

The Multiphased Need Assessment for Program Decisions (MAP) was designed to inform decision makers of a large urban school district concerning the need for early childhood programs in the community. The goals were to indicate the types of programs desired by the community; to bring together public school preschool experts; and to coordinate…

This study of the role of television in the presentation and cultivation of public conceptions of science and technology investigated these issues: (1) the types of representation and information about scientists, science, and technology that are embedded in television programs; (2) types of images and beliefs about science that television tends…