A 12-item survey of English background and proficiency was administered to all Washington State University freshman English students on the first day of class during the fall semester of 1977. A sample of 700 completed questionnaires was selected for analysis. In general, student responses indicated an overall weakness in the teaching of writing…

THE PURPOSE OF THIS SYMPOSIUM WAS TO CONSIDER SOME PROBLEMS FREQUENTLY ENCOUNTERED WHEN PREPARING INSTRUCTIONAL OBJECTIVES AND TO DISCUSS SEVERAL MEANS BY WHICH FUTURE EFFORTS AT IMPLEMENTATION MIGHT BE FACILITATED. TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE--(1) "IN DEFENSE OF INSTRUCTIONAL OBJECTIVES," (2) "SOME IMPORTANT WAYS IN WHICH PERFORMANCE…

SIX NEW YORK CITY DAY CARE CENTERS WITH PROGRAMS SIMILAR TO HEAD START WERE SELECTED AS STUDY SAMPLES TO DETERMINE WHETHER THERE IS A MEASURABLE LONG-RANGE EFFECT OF PRE-SCHOOLING UPON READING ACHIEVEMENT. EACH CENTER WAS CONSIDERED TO HAVE A GOOD PROGRAM, HAD BEEN OPERATING FOR AT LEAST SIX YEARS, AND HAD RACIALLY MIXED POPULATIONS. DAY CARE…

Forty nonclinical psychology graduate students participated in brief small-group interchanges designed as psychotherapy analogues. The interaction was rated by trained judges, and the "clients" in the simulations also rated "therapist" empathy. The most powerful predictor of client-rated empathy was gender, with women receiving higher empathy…

Abramson, Seligman and Teasdale's reformulated model of learned helplessness hypothesized that an attribution of causality intervenes between the perception of noncontingency and the future expectation of future noncontingency. To test this model, relationships between attribution and performance under failure, success, and control conditions were…

Past research has suggested that supervisors, when evaluating the poor performance of a subordinate, are influenced by the outcome of the performance. Nurses (N=55) in advanced training assumed the role of a supervisor of a nurse described as having performed poorly. Half of the subjects read an incident without an outcome and half read an…

The effects of overassignment (three students living in a room usually assigned to two) on students at Rutgers and Douglass Colleges are examined in a study of differences between students housed in two- and three-person rooms for the semester. The dependent measures were perception of the university environment, academic performance, physical…

An analysis of the assessment results and general findings of a statewide assessment in reading conducted in Hawaii in 1975 is presented in this report. Chapters provide a perspective on the assessment program, the preparation of the statewide assessment, the methodology used, the procedures for data analysis, and the results and findings of…

The focus of this paper is on improving the measurement of test anxiety. Background information is given about the role of motivation and the importance of testing. The present research is directed at developing a shorter, more reliable and valid measure of test anxiety, thus furthering the predictive, diagnostic, and test program uses of test…

Staff development activities that affect professional ability must be coupled with efforts toward organizational development if two additional determinants of performance, employee motivation and organizational climate, are to be significantly improved. Indeed, emphasis on staff development alone may have negative effects in that such an approach…

A sample of 188 freshman students was tested for ability in seven areas of reading, prior to the beginning of the academic year; their scores were later related to the cumulative grade point average (CGPA) for their freshman year. Significant correlations were found between CGPA and vocabulary, reflective comprehension, total comprehension, and…

In this study, Hull's Drive Theory was applied to a test of the effects of general anxiety and situational stress upon speakers' lexical diversity, speaking rate, speaking time, and evaluations made of the speakers' ability. Recordings of speeches made by 122 individuals were rated by three judges on scales measuring central idea and analysis,…

Employing a cognitive/motivational analysis, a study was undertaken to determine some specific self-perceptions that might contribute to motivational and performance deficits observed in children with reading difficulties. A total of 72 children of relatively good, average, and poor reading ability were assessed on tasks in which success and…

Reactions of men and women to failure in sex-appropriate and sex-inappropriate tasks were examined through performance records, self-ratings of learning progress, and attributions of performance to effort and ability. Fear of success studies show that individuals may avoid success where success is sex-inappropriate. It was thought that failure…

Four treatment procedures were evaluated for effectiveness in reducing self injurious behavior (SIB) of 22 severely handicapped students. Treatment procedures included contingent restraint, reinforcement withdrawal, differential reinforcement of incompatible behavior, and ommission training (rewarding the S for not emitting the SIB response).…