The General Academic Learning Experience (GALE) is an assessment of community college student knowledge in the liberal arts. The study involved the design and administration of an instrument, which included a demographic survey and a multiple-choice content test. In total, over 2,500 students from 10 colleges in Southern California participated.…

The purpose of this study was to conduct psychometric testing on the Chinese version of the decisional balance scale (CDBS) with Taiwanese seventh, eighth, and ninth graders who were recruited from the Taipei metropolitan area. A random cluster sampling method was used with 554 adolescents between the ages of 13 and 17 years. Factor analysis…

We conducted an observational study of parent-child interaction in home activity settings (routines) of families raising young children with developmental disabilities and problem behavior. Our aim was to empirically investigate the construct validity of coercion in typical but unsuccessful family routines. The long-term goal was to develop an…

The goal of this project was to produce a set of civic measures with sound psychometric properties appropriate for use with young people ages 12-18. Measures selected tap aspects of adolescent civic behaviors, opinions, knowledge, and dispositions. The measures are easy to administer and can be used by educators, staff of community-based…

The objective of this study was to develop a screen assessing domains in at-risk and substance-using adolescents. The Adolescent Domain Screening Inventory (ADSI) consists of four subscales: school, family, community, and individual or peer. A convenience sample of 6,661 youths was employed. Analyses included concurrent criterion validity, known…

The idea that validity should be considered a property of inferences, rather than of assessments, has developed slowly over the past century. In early writings about the validity of educational assessments, validity was defined as a property of an assessment. The most common definition was that an assessment was valid to the extent that it…

Scores from the October 1986 and March 1987 national administrations of the NTE Test of General Knowledge were analyzed to determine if area of undergraduate major was related to performance on the four sections of the test. To control for the range of skills associated with different reasons for taking the test, self-reported cumulative…

Study strategies are the activities that an individual uses to facilitate learning. Although no consistent findings exist to show the factors that comprise the study-strategy concept, a three-factor conceptualization (cognitive, affective, and behavioral) is often suggested. These factors were studied with 128 undergraduates of high and low…

The construct validity of algebra word problems for measuring quantitative reasoning was examined, focusing on an analysis of problem attributes and on the analysis of constructed-response solutions. Constructed-response solutions to 20 problems from the Graduate Record Examinations (GRE) General Test were collected from 51 undergraduates.…

A validation study was conducted on the Child Sex Abuse Attitude Scale (CSAAS) using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to examine the factor structure of three comparative CFA models. Multitrait multimethod analysis was also used to examine the convergent and discriminant validity of the CSAAS. The instrument was developed based on the theory of…

The construct validity of two measures of employee job readiness was investigated by examining the relationships between job readiness and achievement motivation, and between readiness and the variables of education and work experience. The readiness, or maturity level, of employees is an important concept in the situational leadership model,…

The validation of key contextual features of algebra word problems was studied in two phases. In the first phase, five experts were asked to assess the appropriateness of the concepts in the problems and the adequacy of the assignment of the contextual features to the problems. In the second phase, construct validity was established by having 6…

A multimethod, multitrait approach was used to examine the relations of aggression and hyperactivity to mastery motivation in preschool children. Parallel measures of multiple facets of mastery motivation were devised from findings in two studies: (study 1) a maternal report questionnaire for 332 twins, ages 3-5, recruited from the twin registry…

This study represents a continuation of research efforts to further refine the Attitudes & Beliefs on Classroom Control (ABCC) Inventory. Formerly titled the Inventory of Classroom Management Style, the ABCC is an instrument designed to measure teachers' perceptions of their classroom management beliefs and practices. It is based on a…

This study used multiple methods to assess basic community needs and attributes of community atmosphere (cohesion, religious involvement, and recreational activities) in two psychometric studies. Part 1 revised self-report community assessment measures, developed multi-item scales for each construct, and tested reliabilities and factor structures…