We examined the contribution of socioeconomic position to the health and mental health status of children and adolescents with intellectual disabilities in a sample of 10,438 British children. Intellectual disability was a significant risk factor for poorer general health, OR = 4.5, emotional disorders, OR = 2.0, and conduct disorders, OR = 7.7.…

Using latent variable structural equation modeling, we tested a theoretical model positing that grade retention has a positive effect on children's teacher- and peer-rated academic competencies and on sociometric measures of peer acceptance. We also expected that the positive effect of grade retention on peer acceptance would be mediated by…

This study uses the admission scores of Taiwan's Joint College Entrance Examination (JCEE) and occupational wage data to estimate the reputation values of engineering and medical schools in Taiwan. It is found that the reputation values of medical schools are more than twice those of engineering schools. It takes about 7 and 19 years of work for…

The main goal of this study was to assess how sensitive unidimensional parameter estimates derived from BILOG were when the unidimensionality assumption was violated and the underlying ability distribution was not multivariate normal. A multidimensional three-parameter logistic distribution that was a straightforward generalization of the…

A method of estimating Rasch-model difficulty calibrations from judges' ratings of item difficulty is described. The ability of judges to estimate item difficulty was assessed by correlating estimated and empirical calibrations on each of four examinations offered by the American Association of State Social Work Boards. Thirteen members of the…

Issues and problems in assessment research are explored, with suggestions to help establish an acceptable correlation between student assessment scores and final grades. Topics include assessing instructor grading variation, instructor grade point average (GPA), success rates, and lack of linearity in grade scales. Solutions to these problems are…

The Kaufman Brief Intelligence Test (K-BIT) was used as a screening instrument to predict Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children-Third Edition (WISC-III) scores of 94 students referred for psychoeducational evaluations. Although the correlation coefficient between the K-BIT IQ Composite and the WISC-III Full Scale IQ was 0.771 for the entire…

Since canonical correlation analysis subsumes multiple regression as a special case, and since commonality analysis (a variance partitioning procedure) has proven useful in interpreting multiple regression results, the interpretation of canonical correlation results might also be enhanced by the use of commonality analysis. In this paper, a…

Even though Swedish students (age 9 and 14 years) placed third in the recent IEA study, reading instruction in Swedish schools is apparently no better than in other countries taking part in the IEA study. No strong correlations between type of reading instruction and students' reading skills have been found. Schools in Nordic countries work under…

The power of the procedure of W. Stout to detect deviations from essential unidimensionality in two-dimensional data was investigated for minor, moderate, and large deviations from unidimensionality using criteria for deviations from unidimensionality based on prior research. Test lengths of 20 and 40 items and sample sizes of 700 and 1,500 were…

The need for using invariance procedures to establish the external validity or generalizability of statistical results has been well documented. Invariance analysis is a tool that can be used to establish confidence in the replicability of research findings. Several approaches to invariance analysis are available that are broadly applicable across…

The first purpose of this study was to investigate the stability of two essential dimensionality measures across 10 random samples within a particular assessment item (AT1) selection. Other purposes were to investigate the discrepancy of the essential unidimensionality estimates for a test across different AT1 selections and sample sizes and to…

A multi-method approach to the diagnosis of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder was investigated for the purpose of developing an assessment model that could detect the subjects' level of functioning within Mirsky's (1987) four phases of attention and to determine if the primary distractors were by auditory, visual, or combined stimuli.…

Cognitive style indicates how a learner thinks and responds to the environment. Cognitive styles of education majors appear to have an impact on performance in preservice education coursework. This study classifies as field dependent or field independent the cognitive styles of 537 education majors at Auburn University (Montgomery, Alabama) and…

The Pearson product moment (P.M.) correlation ("r") and four of its most widely used variations--the phi, the rho, the biserial, and the point-biserial coefficients--are reviewed. Using small data sets between one and nine, the conditions under which the various forms are restricted in power and robustness are explored. Seven sample data…