Reviews the conclusions about student ratings of teacher effectiveness on which most experts agree, cites some of the main sources of support for these conclusions, and discusses some dissenting opinions and the research support for those opinions. (EV)

Examines student ratings of teacher effectiveness within a new framework that emphasizes six distinct aspects of validity: content, substantive, structural, generalizability, external, and consequential. Concludes that greater attention should be directed toward consequential validity, particularly how ratings are used on today's campuses and what…

Discusses general issues relevant to the use of measures in diverse populations. Describes the ideal strategy for developing a measure of underlying constructs. Describes the relevance of an examination of measurement equivalence in developing a measure for use in diverse populations and key issues to be addressed in measure development. (KB)

Data from the Keirsey Temperament Sorter II online instrument and Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) for 203 college freshmen were analyzed. Positive correlations appeared between the concurrent MBTI and Keirsey measures of psychological type, giving preliminary support to the validity of the online version of Keirsey. (Contains 28 references.)…

The Toglia Category Assessment was used to evaluate the cognitive categorization ability and the capacity to switch conceptual sets of 30 children with severe brain injuries and 30 without impairments. Brain-injured children had significantly lower scores; awareness scores were significantly correlated with performance scores. (Contains 33…

Discusses the development and cross validation of a brief measure of the Research Training Environment Scale-Revised (RTES-R) in counseling graduate programs. Results indicate that the new RTES-R-S total scores correlate strongly with the original form and show good internal consistency. Recommends this new instrument when efficient measurement is…

The Measure of Moral Orientation (MMO) is compared to semistructured interviews with college students. Results support the validity and reliability of MMO as a standardized assessment of moral voice. To understand the specific nature and context of students' moral dilemmas, however, educators must engage in meaningful, direct dialogue with…

Review of tests of musical aptitude indicates that objective assessment of such aptitude is not included in standard career assessment batteries. Reasons include a general decline in use of aptitude measures, less support for artistic/musical aptitudes compared to other fields, and lack of documentation of their applicability to career counseling.…

Examines the Worry Survey (adapted from the Adolescent Health Survey) as regards the developmental concerns of urban African American youths (N=495). Results show that internal consistency of the factor-item ratings on the Personal and Family Worry subscales were acceptable. Less evidence of the reliability was noted among the Peer and…

Examines the reliability and validity of three measures of multicultural competency, the Multicultural Counseling Awareness Scale: Form B (MCAS), the Multicultural Awareness-Knowledge-and Skills Survey (MAKSS), and the Survey of Graduate Students' Experiences with Diversity (GSEDS). The findings generally support the psychometric soundness of…

This study investigates the current research practice concerning reporting measurement validity evidence based on a sample of 696 research reports listed in the American Psychological Association's Directory of Unpublished Experimental Mental Measures. Only 55% of the reports included any type of validity evidence. This was a substantially lower…

We introduce a personality inventory designed to measure six major dimensions of personality derived from lexical studies of personality structure. The HEXACO Personality Inventory (HEXACO-PI) consists of 24 facet-level personality trait scales that define the six personality factors named Honesty-Humility (H), Emotionality (E), Extraversion (X),…

This is a validation study of a computerized adaptive (CAT) version of the Schedule for Nonadaptive and Adaptive Personality (SNAP) conducted with 413 undergraduates who completed the SNAP twice, 1 week apart. Participants were assigned randomly to 1 of 4 retest groups: (a) paper-and-pencil (P&P) SNAP, (b) CAT, (c) P&P/CAT, and (d) CAT/P&P. With…

The theories of validity developed over the past 60 years are quite sophisticated, but the methodology of validity is not generally very effective. The validity evidence for major testing programs is typically much weaker than the evidence for more technical characteristics such as reliability. In addition, most validation efforts have a strong…

A paper appearing in this journal by Klein, Hamilton, McCaffrey and Stecher (2000) attempted to raise serious questions about the validity of the gains in student performance as measured by Texas' standardized test, the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS). Part of their analysis was based on the results of three tests which they…