Purpose: The purpose of this tutorial is to describe 10 criteria that may help clinicians distinguish between scientific and pseudoscientific treatment claims. The criteria are illustrated, first for considering whether to use a newly developed treatment and second for attempting to understand arguments about controversial treatments. Method:…

Understanding how to evaluate a theory, whether that theory is a self-constructed hunch or a scholar's formal set of propositions, is a vital foundation needed by students as they apply communication theories to their everyday lives. In many communication theory courses, the criteria for theory evaluation are introduced early in the semester. As a…

The notion of an impact factor was first posited by Eugene Garfield (1972) to study the use, prestige, and status of scientific journals. The Institute for Scientific Information created the impact factor as a means to measure the number of times an "average article" published in a journal was cited over a particular time period ("The impact…

In August 2001, the American Psychological Association (APA) Council of Representatives approved as APA policy the "Criteria for Practice Guideline Development and Evaluation" (APA, 2002b), developed by the Board of Professional Affairs Committee on Professional Practice and Standards (COPPS). The present document was developed in response to a…

Using a life course perspective, this study analyzes the adaptive strategy of community selection utilized by middle-class dual-earner couples, as well as the perceived family friendliness of their communities. Although many common concerns exist (most paramount being safety, jobs, and housing quality), parents are more apt than nonparents to…

Kappa (Cohen, 1960) is a popular agreement statistic used to estimate the accuracy of observers. The response of kappa to differing baserates was examined and methods for estimating the accuracy of observers presented. Results suggest that setting a single value of kappa as "minimally acceptable" (i.e., a criterion value) is not useful in ensuring…

This paper argues that to fulfil what is required of a model of children's spiritual development in the context of secular educative care, six criteria must be met: the meaning of the terms and nature of the phenomenon must both be specified; the relationship to an underlying ontology must be clarified and the status of alternatives characterized;…

Minimization of the within-cluster sums of squares (WCSS) is one of the most important optimization criteria in cluster analysis. Although cluster analysis modules in commercial software packages typically use heuristic methods for this criterion, optimal approaches can be computationally feasible for problems of modest size. This paper presents a…

Due to the central role of textbooks in the teaching and learning of science, it is imperative that textbooks provide correct content and instructional support. We investigated how 16 South African Grade 7 natural science educators selected their textbooks and how they evaluated these textbooks. The results were analysed according to the…

Senate Bill 1908 includes additional criteria for designating school grades for senior high schools with grades 9 through 12 or 10 through 12. Beginning in 2009-10, 50% of the school's grade will be based on the existing FCAT-related factors and the remaining 50% will be based on other factors including graduation rates, participation in…

For the past few years the Florida School Code has set the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) performance requirements for promotion of 3rd graders and graduation for 10 graders. Grade 3 students who do not score at level 2 or higher on the FCAT SSS Reading must be retained unless exempted for special circumstances. Grade 10 students…

Since the year 2000, Saudi universities have cancelled all admission tests and have adopted an open admission policy that depends on high school GPA only. Many high school graduates in Saudi Arabia, especially females, show a great interest in joining colleges of languages and translation and admission to those colleges has been highly…

The use of RPL (Recognition of Prior Learning) in higher education to assess RPL candidates for admission into programmes of study met with a lot of criticism from faculty academics. Lecturers viewed the possibility of admitting large numbers of under-qualified adult learners, as a threat to the institution's reputation, or an erosion of academic…

The premise of this article is that the visual arts can provide a valuable tool for social transformation. The application of this role of the arts in community-engaged research has revealed specific challenges for developing broader assessment criteria for evaluation. This article will explore a case study of a Fine Art Masters student's…

Recent research of student writing has included a few studies of the statement of purpose submitted as part of the admission process to programs of study, which have indicated variations in expectations by disciplinary gatekeepers. These studies indicate a need for further study of statements of purpose submitted to different departments, informed…