This study reports on how an American Education System course, traditionally taught with broad objectives, was contextualized for science teachers. Using pre-assessment data, specific policy issues were targeted with the objective of increasing teachers' feelings of influence over issues. The approach used was adapted from exposure therapy, a…

The relationship of internality-externality and dominance-submissiveness to student preference for course structure and course difficulty was examined for 86 college students. Preference measures were used, which focused on specific dimensions of instruction--structure and difficulty. In contrast to some other research results, internal and…

The influence of student personality on the effects of the Personalized System of Instruction (PSI) was examined. Three testing systems (midterm and final exams; bimonthly tests; and PSI) were examined along with three personality dimensions (internal-external locus of control, need for achievement, and need for autonomy). There were no…

The purpose of this paper is to consider different kinds of actions learners may take during computer assisted instruction (CAI), and to examine the kind of information they need in order to exercise control over the instruction, i.e., information about their performance level, the organization of the content, the choices available to them and the…

Examines the effects of three self-pacing procedures on student withdrawal rate, rate of progress, final examination performance, and attitude in a personalized system of instruction for undergraduate students in an introductory speech course. Benefits of reducing student procrastination are discussed in light of the study's results. (Author/MBR)

A prescriptive theory for learning which delivers prescriptions for designing prototypes of instructional materials with different knowledge structures, the Elaboration Theory of Instruction (ETI) is based on important principles and theories of learning and instruction. This paper reports three experiments which tested ETI. The first experiment…

A study of 2,392 freshman in 23 diverse two- and four-year colleges in 16 states found a number of variables associated with students' internal attribution at the end of the first college year. Variables included college type (two- vs. four-year), exposure to postsecondary education, work responsibilities, course organization, instructional…