This study explored motivation and engagement among North American (the United States and Canada; n = 1,540), U.K. (n = 1,558), Australian (n = 2,283), and Chinese (n = 3,753) secondary school students. Motivation and engagement were assessed via students' responses to the Motivation and Engagement Scale-High School (MES-HS). Confirmatory factor…

Generalizations of the G index as a measure of similarity between persons beyond the dichotomous situation are discussed. An attempt is made to present a generalization that does not require dichotomization of the items for cases where the number of response alternatives may differ. (Author/JKS)

Evaluates the similarity of six statistical association measures in information retrieval by comparing the relationship and behavior they demonstrate in analyses of a test corpus. Highlights include comparisons of ranked term pairs and term clusters, multidimensional scaling, and the impact of term frequency on the association values by means of a…

Procedures for analyzing common item effects on interscale structure were reviewed and a study using smallest space analysis of the California Psychological Inventory (CPI) reported. Solutions of three matrices--intercorrelation matrix of the original CPI scales, of reduced scales (with common items removed), and of the number of common…

More than one correlation coefficient can be computed between two variables when the data can be organized into subsets determined by one of more grouping factors. Implications of this fact are discussed when the variables are items and the correlations are being computed for purposes of scale development. (Author/

Multidimensional scaling (MDS) and exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were compared in the assessment of the dimensionality of data sets, using sets generated to be one-dimensional or two-dimensional and differing in degree of interdimensional correlation and number of items defining a dimension. (SLD)

The aim of this study is to suggest an alternative to the essay testing method of assessing structural understanding of concepts, which suffers from time constraints and lack of scoring reliability. In this method, students' relationship judgments between concept pairs are examined directly rather than by means of multidimensional scaling analysis…