This paper aims to investigate students' likes and dislikes of the teaching that they have experienced and its effects on students' perceptions of the learning environment, student learning and academic performance. The study compares a lecture-based setting to a student-activating learning/teaching environment, considering both instructional and…

The study reported here aimed to establish whether the stakes of examinations taken by students in the final two years of compulsory education in the UK were associated with degree of self-reported examination anxiety, and whether examination stakes moderated the anxiety-examination grade relationship. Data were collected from 615 students who…

The authors investigated the effectiveness of the Triad Training Model (P. Pedersen, 1994a, 1994b, 2000a, 2000b) on influencing counselor empathy, intolerance for ambiguity, and multicultural competency by using a quasi-experimental treatment group comparison design. No significant differences among the triad training group and two comparison…

Paul Stapleton's (2006) critique of quantitative research brings to the surface some common interpretive problems arising when experimental and quasi-experimental research designs are compared. While Stapleton may be correct in pointing out the superiority of experimental research designs because they best eliminate the influence of extraneous…

Is the use of an online course delivery format, when compared with the more traditional face-to-face format, good or bad in the context of university education? Those who subscribe to the no-significant-difference perspective argue that online delivery is good, because it allows students with time and geographic distance constraints to obtain the…

This paper provides an account of the methodological approach of a study designed to address some fundamental questions relating to formative assessment. The paper reports on the use of a critically quasi-ethnographic approach and describes the practicalities of adopting such an approach. The validity of the study is also considered, reflecting on…

Purpose: The feasibility of a community-level drug prevention intervention based upon the principles of motivational interviewing within a further education college was investigated in a pilot study. Design/methodology/approach: The implementation over the course of a single term of "Let's Talk about Drugs" was studied with both action…

Institutions of higher education have developed a host of interventions to increase the retention of first-year students whose academic performance is inadequate. This study evaluated the overall effectiveness of an intervention strategy designed for first-year students on academic probation at a mid-western research university. A…

In an attempt to find ways to improve persistence rates in its distance courses, the Cegep@distance introduced different forms of collaboration (peer interaction and collaborative learning activities) in selected courses. A mixed methodology was used to understand the effects of these interventions, relying on a quasi-experimental design for the…

Analysis strategies are discussed for the nonequivalent control group design when three models of continuous natural growth are known. For Model I type natural growth it was shown that the fan spread hypothesis always holds, and Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA), Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) of Residualized Gain Scores, and ANOVA of Standardized…

Since usually no defensible option for performing a task within quasi-experimentation is unbiased, it is desirable to select several options that reflect biases in different directions. The benefits of applying a critical multiplism approach to causal hypotheses, group nonequivalence, and units of analysis in quasi-experimentation is discussed.…

Confusion about the meaning of validity in quasi-experimental research can be addressed by carefully relabeling types of validity. Internal validity can more aptly be termed "local molar causal validity." More tentatively, the "principle of proximal similarity" can be substituted for the concept of external validity. (Author)

The evaluation of competing analysis strategies based on estimator bias and variance is demonstrated using gains in standard scores and analysis of covariance procedures for quasi-experiments conforming to the fan-spread hypothesis. The findings do not lead to a uniform recommendation of either approach. (Author/JKS)

Six estimators of treatment effect when assignment to treatment groups is based on the covariate are compared in terms of empirical standard errors and percent relative bias. Results show that simple analysis of covariance estimator is not always appropriate. (Author/GK)

Two computer-intensive procedures are presented for dealing with non-random selection in the development of samples for experimental, quasi-experimental, and survey designs associated with educational research. The procedures are randomization tests to clarify treatment effects and bootstrap techniques to estimate the uncertainty of…