Research into the effects on attitudes of persuasive communications has continued to focus primarily on the empirical analysis of communication and source effects. While theory has been used to guide the work, it is less of the grand and overpowering variety, and more of the kind that employs assumptions about basic psychological processes that…

A tailored testing model employing the beta distribution, whose mean equals the difficulty of an item and whose variance is approximately equal to the sampling variance of the item difficulty, and employing conditional item difficulties, is proposed. The model provides a procedure by which a minimum number of items of a test, consisting of a set…

The issue of multiple-choice (MC) vs. created-response (CR) test-item formats was reexamined at the eighth-grade level in three subject areas: general science, American history, and arithmetic. In each subject area, alternate forms with the same item-content but differing in which items were in which format were prepared from standardized tests.…

Likert-type inventories of children's attitude toward the world of work were administered to approximately 1,500 students in grades 2-8. The positively and negatively stated scores were analyzed separately. Agreement with positively stated items showed almost no difference among the various grades. However, the trend toward more disagreement among…

The present series of studies was undertaken to explore intersensory processing in the very young. In the first experiment 1-, 4- and 7-month-old infants experienced simultaneously their mothers' faces and voices. The various conditions consisted of displacing the voice from the face. The results indicated that infants as young as one month of age…

How the mode of input of stimuli affects the quality or type of response was studied by comparing the number of paradigmatic responses and syntagmatic responses to both orally and visually presented stimulus words. The following groups, totaling 194 subjects, were involved in four experiments: (1) 18 institutionalized disturbed adolescents, (2) 96…

Criteria and methods for developing a taxonomy for different situational categories are presented. (CK)

The forced-choice and a questionnaire format of the Thorndike Dimensions of Temperament were administered under regular and desirability directions to college students. The forced-choice format produced low scale intercorrelations under the regular directions, but under the desirability directions a common factor appeared. The same factor appeared…

The relative effectiveness of client-centered, rational-emotive, and desensitization therapies in reducing test anxiety among high school students was investigated. The sample was drawn from 2336 students in grades 10 through 12 who were administered the Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI). Thirty-three subjects with high State…

The stated purpose of the text is to review and interpret current behavioral research in mental retardation (including that done abroad) and to provide a forum for theories and new approaches. Eight chapters by different authors focus on the following subjects: medical-behavioral research; recognition memory: a research strategy and summary of…

Using a conformity research methodology, the authors investigated the questions of whether (a) the Asch-type conformity setting produces greater yielding than variant settings where subjects are screened from one another and (b) the nonverbal element of contradictory or inconsistent nonverbal communications significantly alters response to the…

Following nine hours of training in behavioral psychology, the faculty members of an 800 pupil elementary school were applying operant techniques with no further apparent need of consultation with the instructors. Twenty-two teachers were enrolled in an inservice training course entitled "Behavior Modification Procedures for the Elementary…

The objectives of the program were to provide reading remediation and curriculum enrichment through the use of audiovisual resources and to train teachers in using new instructional media and developing new instructional techniques. The program was coordinated by a full-time teacher with the help of one paraprofessional assistant in each…

The requirements for a theory of instruction can be described in the following list of criteria: 1) a model of the learning process; 2) specification of admissible instructional actions; 3) specification of instructional objectives; 4) a measurement scale that permits costs to be assigned to each of the instructional actions and payoffs to the…

The impact which program evaluation and subsequent short-term in-service education efforts had upon the curricular programs of two distinctly different school settings was assessed. In addition, the appropriateness of the Kunkel-McElhinney model of curriculum evaluation, as perceived by professional school personnel, was examined and assessed. The…