This report provides information on the number and percentage of students retained in grade during the 1983-84 school term in the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD). Data were analyzed from reports filed by all principals and from the LAUSD Racial and Ethnic Survey, Fall 1983. Children's centers, adult schools, occupational centers, and…

Each year large numbers of children experience academic failure during the first 3 years of their public school involvement. Many studies have been done using demographic and norm-referenced tests to try to identify at-risk-for-failure youngsters either at the preschool level or early during their school experience. Most attempts have been costly…

A study was designed to determine what student factors contributed to the 36% failure rate on a required competency test in writing at Southwest Texas State University and to assess the perceived impact of this test requirement on both faculty and students. Data were collected to establish a student profile of the student most likely to fail the…

Individual differences in same-aged children's reasoning about effort and ability, as well as the consequences of different forms of reasoning in actual achievement situations, were investigated. It was hypothesized that different forms of children's reasoning would be related to different (helpless versus mastery-oriented) motivational patterns.…

As this paper demonstrates, studying abortive educational reforms reveals a great deal about the complex political dynamics involved in making (and unmaking) key policy decisions. Using case studies of France and West Germany, the paper argues that the state in advanced industrial countries tends to maximize the political gains derived from…

This study targeted students with a history of academic failure to investigate the relationships among reported self-regulated learning strategies, attributional patterns, academic performance expectancies, and academic performance. Ninety-seven community college students, over 70% of whom were minority group members, completed self-report…

An examination of the dynamics of academic failure is presented in this monograph in the form of an annotated bibliography of current literature. The writings cited offer a cross-section of research on what factors affect students' choices of adaptive or maladaptive behavior patterns in the classroom and in relation to their peers. Section one of…

Psychological researchers continue to debate the relative contribution of ability and effort to feelings of self-worth. To investigate student preferences for ability or effort and their relationship to self-worth, and to assess the relative contribution of ability and effort to affective experience, two separate studies were undertaken. In the…

The reluctance of depressed people to try hard may result not from their low expectancy for success, as Learned Helplessness Theory suggests, but rather from egotistic motivation to preserve whatever self-esteem they still have. Two studies were conducted using a paradigm which permitted a direct comparison of Learned Helplessness Theory and…

College students were asked to recall experiences of success and of failure from their own lives, and to indicate what they believed to be the reasons for success or failure. Results indicated that (1) women were more likely than men to attribute success to effort; (2) men attributed success to luck more often than women; (3) women had more pride…

Researchers in attribution theory have used two styles in wording attributional questions. The informational style asks subjects the extent to which they possess ability, effort and luck relative to a task, and task difficulty. The causal style asks subjects the extent to which various factors influenced or caused the outcome. A study was…

This study discusses a plan designed for a ten-year-old emotionally disturbed boy which included positive feedback for academic achievement and positive social emotional feedback from peers. The results indicated that in the changed class classroom environment, the frequency of maladaptive behaviors decreased. (Author/PC)

This paper compares the literary success of two novels published in 1955: "The Dollmaker," by Harriette Arnow, and "A Fable," by William Faulkner. Reviews of each book reflect that Arnow's book was judged excellent, while Faulkner's book was considered rough and unpolished. In spite of the reviews, Faulkner received the…

Causal attributions were obtained from male and female subjects of two racial groups, black and white, following achievement performance in a "natural" setting. Although women expected lower grades than men, no significant differences in attributional ratings as function of gender were observed, nor were any race by gender interactions seen in the…

This paper briefly reviews how New York City has developed its bureaucratic school structures, the pathologies that have developed within them, and some remedies that can help to change them into structures that will improve city schools. Some historians claimed that reformers purposely created bureaucratic school systems to provide a docile pool…