Outlines methodology employed during six-month period to integrate quantitative and qualitative research results. The project, involving mainstreamed learning-disabled students' problems with homework assignments, was designed to study educational issues through use of directed focus groups in which groups discuss specific topic in detail.…

Explores the consistency and accuracy of faculty evaluation, peer evaluation and self-evaluation of applied end-of-semester performances. Finds that faculty inter-judge reliability was uneven, while student peer inter-judge reliability was more uniform; faculty-peer evaluations were highly correlated, but self-evaluations were poorly correlated…

A quantitative study modeled the inherently subjective admissions process for 592 graduate school candidates and 72 raters. Logistic regression models were well-fitting and parsimonious, allowing analysis of each stage of the process. Extended committee discussion/deliberation phases were of limited productivity when inter-rater agreement was…

Demonstrates how Rasch models can be used to study differences in item salience within and across time points, and that even if a test does not fulfill assumptions of the Rasch model, it can be used to obtain information on item functioning across participants and over time. Illustrates method using longitudinal data from Baltimore Prevention…

Investigates the general factor and uniqueness characteristics of the individual tests of the Woodcock-Johnson Test of Cognitive Ability-Revised (WJTCA-R). Only 2 of the 19 WJTCA-R tests examined had low general factor loadings, while 2 had low uniqueness. All other tests had medium or high uniqueness. Discusses implications for clinical…

This study describes and documents reliability reporting practices in dissertation studies that have used the "Behavior Assessment System for Children" (BASC). Only 9 of 106 studies examined reported reliability for subpopulations. The lack of reliability score estimates has implications for use of the BASC to identify culturally diverse…

The present paper describes the design, implementation and evaluation of a cryptography module for final-year software engineering students. The emphasis is on implementation architectures and practical cryptanalysis rather than a standard mathematical approach. The competitive continuous assessment process reflects this approach and rewards…

Autism susceptibility genes likely have effects on continuously distributed autism-related traits, yet few measures of such traits exist. The Broader Phenotype Autism Symptom Scale (BPASS), developed for use with affected children and family members, measures social motivation, social expressiveness, conversational skills, and flexibility. Based…

This study addresses the sample error and linking bias that occur with small and unrepresentative samples in a non-equivalent groups anchor test (NEAT) design. We propose a linking method called the "synthetic function," which is a weighted average of the identity function (the trivial equating function for forms that are known to be…

Behavioral observation has become increasingly important in research in developmental and clinical psychology, as well as in program evaluation and instructional research. Several statistical approaches to assessing the dependability of behavioral observation were reviewed. The demand for accurate and efficient paradigms for behavioral observation…

An explicit model identifying 10 relevant components of achievement gain scores has been developed. Based on that model, all students under consideration are stratified according to individual observed pretest score, and achievement gains are measured relative to the average and range of gains among students in the same prescore stratum. The…

Much previously published material for estimating the reliability of classification has been based on the assumption that a test consists of a known number of equally weighted items. The test score is the number of those items answered correctly. These methods cannot be used with classifications based on weighted composite scores, especially if…

More research is needed to distinguish between actual and artificial sex differences, and greater attention should be paid to individual differences, since at this point sex appears to account for very little variability in human performance. (JC)

Exploratory research with large numbers of variables and even larger numbers of relationships is likely to result in frequent Type II errors; that is falsely accepting an incorrect null hypotheses. There are three ways of reducing Type II errors: (1) choosing a lower significance level, which then increases the probability of Type I error; (2)…

THE PURPOSE OF THIS RESEARCH WAS TO STUDY THE EFFECT OF ERROR OF MEASUREMENT UPON THE POWER OF STATISTICAL TESTS. ATTENTION WAS FOCUSED ON THE F-TEST OF THE SINGLE FACTOR ANALYSIS OF VARIANCE. FORMULAS WERE DERIVED TO SHOW THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE NONCENTRALITY PARAMETERS FOR ANALYSES USING TRUE SCORES AND THOSE USING OBSERVED SCORES. THE…