Evaluations should be issues driven, not methods driven. The starting point should be priority programs to be evaluated or policies to be tested. From this starting point, a list of evaluation questions is identified. For each evaluation question, the task is to identify the best available method for answering that question. Hence it is likely…

Ill-discipline in public schools predates compulsory education in the United States. Disciplinary policies and laws enacted to combat the problem have met with minimal success. Research and recommendations have generally focused on the indiscipline problems ubiquitous in intermediate, junior and senior high schools. However, similar misbehaviors…

Psychiatric disorders are unusually prevalent among current and former inmates, but it is not known what this relationship reflects. A putative causal relationship is contaminated by assorted influences, including childhood disadvantage, the early onset of most disorders, and the criminalization of substance use. Using the National Comorbidity…

This article addresses the question of why the emotions children and adolescents anticipate in the context of hypothetical scenarios have been repeatedly found to predict actual (im)moral behavior. It argues that a common motivational account of this relationship is insufficient. Instead, three links are proposed that connect cognitive…

The present study used a cross-sectional survey design to examine how adolescent depressive mood was related to attributional styles and coping strategies with a sample of 326 youths (aged 8-14 years). With the cutting point adopted in the West, 20.9% of the current sample reported depressive symptoms. Regression analysis results show that, with…

Panel surveys are widely used in sociology to examine life-course trajectories and to assess causal effects. However, when using panel data researchers usually assume that the act of measuring respondents' attitudes and behaviors has no effect on the attributes being measured or on the accuracy of reports about those attributes. Evidence from…

The codevelopment of delinquent behaviors and depressive symptoms from Grade 9 to 11 was investigated on an Italian sample of 518 adolescents (399 male) after the transition to high school, evaluating the time-invariant effects of past school failure and social failure and the time-varying effects of school achievement and social problems.…

Significant advances have occurred regarding the understanding of etiologic processes that give rise to eating disorders and the design and evaluation of efficacious prevention programs and treatment interventions. Herein we offer suggestions regarding potentially fruitful directions for future research in these areas. We suggest it would be…

This literature review looks at recent research into job burnout and self-efficacy, with an emphasis into the teaching profession. The Maslach Burnout Inventory has been the standard instrument for almost all burnout research. MBI's three subscales include emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and reduced personal accomplishment. Research shows…

In many higher education systems around the world increasing retention is vital if institutions are to produce the number of graduates identified through government projections to meet industry needs. Taking Australia as an example, the analysis uses results from a large-scale survey of undergraduate students to review rates and rationales for…

Despite the great value of student learning outcome assessment (SLOA), faculty have not fully embraced the assessment movement, and many remain locked in debates on its merits. To gain faculty buy-in and explain why many faculty were motivated to engage in outcome assessment, the modified CANE (Commitment And Necessary Effort) model was used to…

Computer Science (CS) courses comprise both Programming and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) issues; however these two areas have substantial differences, inter alia the attitudes and beliefs of the students regarding the intended learning content. In this research, factors from the Social Cognitive Theory and Unified Theory of…

A single case study approach was used to provide an in-depth examination of the special events that take place in the experiences of a graduate mathematics teaching assistant (MTA) during adaptation to a variety of physical, emotional, and psychological issues. Through intervention by a faculty member, professional counselor, and medical doctor,…

Tobacco addiction and chronic pain represent 2 highly prevalent and comorbid conditions that engender substantial burdens upon individuals and systems. Interrelations between pain and smoking have been of clinical and empirical interest for decades, and research in this area has increased dramatically over the past 5 years. We conceptualize the…

Education policy-makers and practitioners want to know which policies and practices can best achieve their goals. But research that can inform evidence-based policy often requires complex methods to distinguish causation from accidental association. Avoiding econometric jargon and technical detail, this paper explains the main idea and intuition…