Background: Practical tools are needed that reliably measure the complex physical activity (PA) and nutrition environments of elementary schools that influence children's health and learning behaviors for obesity prevention. The School Physical Activity and Nutrition-Environment Tool (SPAN-ET) was developed and beta tested in 6 rural Oregon…

The current study sought to scientifically adapt the existing five essentials teacher survey and develop a new parent survey, and pilot test them for use in early childhood education settings. The adaptation and development of these "Early Education Surveys" occurred in 2014-15, was based strongly on Bryk et al.'s (2010) existing…

Several challenges arise when researchers or practitioners attempt to assess the literacy skills of toddlers, including a lack of developmentally appropriate measures, toddlers' more limited communication ability, and how literacy is defined in the years before age three. This paper describes four new measures of early literacy development and…

The nutrition environment in schools can influence the risk for childhood overweight and obesity, which in turn can have life-long implications for risk of chronic disease. This dissertation aimed to examine the nutrition environment in primary public schools in California with regards to the amount of nutrition education provided in the…

The purpose of this study was to develop a reliable and valid survey instrument to measure student perceptions of the outdoor physical campus environment. Using campus planning and environments literature and expert consultation, a survey instrument was developed to measure student satisfaction with the outdoor campus environment and the…

This study validated a Perceived Campus Caring Scale with 1,520 university students. Using factor analysis, seven factors namely, Faculty Support, Nonfaculty Support, Peer Relationship, Sense of Detachment, Sense of Belonging, Caring Attitude, and Campus Involvement, are identified with high reliability, validity, and close correlation with the…

Work-related self-efficacy at a core task level fits with the social cognitive career theory explaining the career development of people with severe mental illness. The aim of this study was to further investigate the psychometric properties of the "Work-related Self- Efficacy Scale" for use with people with psychiatric disabilities. Sixty…

The use of e-assessment in higher education is a relatively new educational practice that has been more frequently studied in recent years. This review aims to summarise some research on e-assessment, providing an overview based on articles from three well-established scientific journals. Focusing on research topics, settings for e-assessment and…

This paper tests a central implication of the theory of equalizing differences, that workers sort into jobs with different attributes based on their preferences. We present evidence from four new time-use data sets for the United States and France suggesting that workers who are more gregarious, as revealed by their behavior when they are not…

The "Restrictiveness of Living Environment Scale" has long been the primary way to conceptualize the "restrictiveness" of a child's living situation. However, changes in systems of care and other factors have created a need to revisit how restrictiveness is conceptualized and measured. A measure was created to assess an environment's level of…

The purpose of the study was to describe the development and application of an instrument to identify various dimensions of the learning environment, as perceived by elementary and middle school students in Taiwan. The instrument, the New Constructivist Learning Environment Scales, includes four dimensions: attitude concerning instruction,…

The development and validation of the Home Learning Environment Profile (HLEP) are outlined. The HLEP instrument was designed to assess successful preschool home educational programs for Hawaiian families. The instrument covers sociodemographic, cultural, and environmental factors of Hawaiian families. After an extensive review of published…

The development of environmental process measures marks a significant step forward in the assessment of environment quality. As Bloom (1964) predicted, these measures have made it possible to more clearly delineate the relationship between environment and development. Although factorial structure of many process instruments is open to question,…

An extension is described of Marcia's (1966) Identity Status Interview into three interpersonal domains: friendship, dating, and sex roles. Justification for the new sections is provided on the basis of theory and research on sex differences in adolescent identity. Methodological refinements in the interview are presented. (Author/PN)

The Pupil Role Interview was developed and administered to students in Follow Through and non-Follow Trhough programs. Data was gathered concerning the instrument's reliability and construct validity, and comparisons were made among programs on the basis of interview responses. Findings confirmed the hypothesis of a relationship between Follow…