Kernel equating is a method of equating test scores devised by P. W. Holland and D. T. Thayer (1989). It takes its name from kernel smoothing, a process of smoothing a function by replacing each discrete value with a frequency distribution. It can be used when scores on two forms of a test are to be equated directly or when they are to be equated…

The test of homogeneity developed by L. V. Hedges (1982) for the fixed effects model is frequently used in quantitative meta-analyses to test whether effect sizes are equal. Despite its widespread use, evidence of the behavior of this test for the less-than-ideal case of small study sample sizes paired with large numbers of studies is…

Clinicians use a common practice of reporting age or grade equivalent derived scores, but problems of interpretation exist for such scores. This article examines derived comparison score issues and recommends use of scores of relative standing such as percentile ranks or standard scores in contrast to use of developmental scores like age and grade…

In order to obtain conditional maximum likelihood estimates, the so-called conditioning estimates have to be calculated. In this paper a method is examined that does not calculate these constants exactly, but approximates them using Monte Carlo Markov Chains. As an example, the method is applied to the conditional estimation of both item and…

Model-based methods for estimating the population mean in stratified clustered sampling are described. The importance of adjusting the weights is assessed by an approach considering the sampling variation of the adjusted weights and its (variance) components. The resulting estimators are more efficient than the jackknife estimators for a variety…

Approaches for norming skewed test score distributions are reviewed, and an analytical approach is proposed for norming the Behavior Assessment System for Children (BASC). Methods used in constructing norms for several well-known personality instruments that are reviewed include: (1) linear T-scores transformation in the Minnesota Multiphasic…

This simple method for simulating the Central Limit Theorem with students in a beginning nonmajor statistics class requires students to use dice to simulate drawing samples from a discrete uniform distribution. On a chalkboard, the distribution of sample means is superimposed on a graph of the discrete uniform distribution to provide visual…

Increasing the level of educational attainment of the population may not always increase the social benefits for those who receive the education. In fact, when a high percentage of the population attains a certain level of education, that attainment ceases to provide socioeconomic benefits; instead, those few who have not reached that educational…

Bureau of Labor statistics prove that schools are not top-heavy with administrators, contrary to the myth and Secretary William Bennett's assertion. Administrators comprise 6.6 percent of school employees and public education ranks 28 out of 35 occupations in terms of the percentage of administrative personnel. Accounting and bookkeeping lead with…

Investigated effect of the high skewness typically present in distributions of depressive symptom scores on findings of a gender difference in depression. Skewness allowed a few extreme scores among women to produce significant between-groups differences in untransformed scores even when male and female groups' distributions were otherwise…

Proposes split model for index term distribution in document set that uses rank function for high frequency terms and size function for low frequency terms; the point of transition is determined either empirically or by rule. Distributions to describe index term exhaustivity and term co-occurrence are considered briefly. (36 references) (EJS)

The Generalized Inverse Gaussian-Poisson Distribution is suggested as an all-embracing mathematical model for bibliometric frequency distributions. Twelve examples are given which show that the new model cannot be rejected by virtue of an objective chi-squared test. A mathematical appendix and 20 references are included. (Author/EJS)

Rosenthan's (1979) concept of fail-safe N has thus far been applied to probability levels exclusively. This note introduces a fail-safe N for effect size. (Author)

This paper presents a summary of action research investigating statistics students' understandings of the sampling distribution of the mean. With four sections of an introductory Statistics in Education course (n=98 students), a computer simulation activity (R. delMas, J. Garfield, and B. Chance, 1999) was implemented and evaluated to show…

Two new indices to detect answer copying on a multiple-choice test, S(1) and S(2) (subscripts), are proposed. The S(1) index is similar to the K-index (P. Holland, 1996) and the K-overscore(2), (K2) index (L. Sotaridona and R. Meijer, in press), but the distribution of the number of matching incorrect answers of the source (examinee s) and the…