This first-person account of a case study on family therapy discusses two latency-age boys who were referred for treatment. The assessment was that in both cases it was the family itself that was disturbed and needed treatment. The therapist worked with the first boy and his family together. The therapy model used was the "proper" family…

This paper reports two studies which examined sequential dependence in the dyadic interaction between mother and infant. In the first study, brief videotaped behavioral samples were collected for 24 primiparous mother-infant (M - I) dyads to examine the degree of reciprocal contingency in M - I interactions. Two coders, using a computer interfaced…

Acculturation patterns of immigrants into American society have been examined through various disciplinary perspectives--anthropology, sociology, psychology, psychiatry, and, more recently, communications. Although acculturation is defined somewhat differently by different disciplines, it can be generally interpreted as the overall process of…

This review of literature examines and critiques research on the relationship among subject matter, teaching, and research in the arts. Research on the relationship between content and teaching practices is examined first. The author questions theories of the teacher as artist, discovery learning, and drill-and-practice instruction as related to…

Attitude and opinion research requires considerable planning, careful design of survey procedures and sampling techniques, and practical ways of collecting, analyzing, and reporting results. The following suggestions are based on the extensive public opinion research conducted by the University of Alabama. (1) Decide what specific problem is to be…

The evaluation design, which prescribes when and from whom to gather data, is described as significant because it can lend credibility to evaluation results. The objectives of this booklet are to aid the evaluator in: choosing a design; putting it into operation; and analyzing and reporting the data. Examples include both formative and summative…

Differences in 164 fifth grade students' reading comprehension scores were obtained with four different tasks typically used to measure comprehension (multiple choice, recall, cloze, and maze), using four different reading passages that were equated according to readability formulas. Data analyses revealed significant effects for passage, task,…

The failure of educational research to fully allow for limitations in methodology when drawing conclusions is faulted. In addition to this, a failure on the part of the media--educational and other--to fully publicize these limitations is also criticized. Methodological shortcomings of the 1977-78 American Institutes of Research (AIR) study of…

The role played by evaluation is important in models or designs for research in English teacher preparation. English educators must rely on general studies of teacher effectiveness for what little is known about evaluating teachers and for designs or models of research on English teacher preparation. Whatever the classification scheme of the…

A cost-benefit and system-analysis approach was utilized in an effort to study the quality of education in the State of Kentucky. This first report of that 2-year study relates: background information problems of measuring quality; methodology employed; rankings of the 197 school districts; and the input, output, and process variables. Two…

Some of the problems unique to evaluation research, in particular to the evaluation of longitudinal studies of social programs, are presented. A working model found to be useful in structuring compensatory education program evaluation activities is also offered. Since the goals of social programs such as Head Start are dynamic rather than static,…

The difficulties in evaluating bilingual education appear to have prevented success in all but a few evaluation attempts, but better and more meaningful evaluation is neccessary in order to identify the strengths and weaknesses of bilingual programs. Many bilingual programs are undergoing constant modification, adequate assessment instruments have…

It appears that relatively little thought has been given to the methods for reviewing, synthesizing, and reporting the results of a set of empirical studies on a given substantive topic. The question is raised as to whether the studies that have been reviewed constitute a population or a sample, and if a sample, whether they are representative or…

This volume resulted from an attempt to compile comprehensive and accurate data about the popular reaction to social change for a seminar attended by European and American social scientists. The volume contains eight papers which reflect the three objectives of the seminar: (1) a review of psychological indicators of social change; (2) an…

The first author set out to design and secure funding for an hypothesis-based program in a public school setting. The natural history of what happened to that study as it proceeded from design, to funding, to actual implementation, to final reporting serves as the case history of two idealistic evaluators' wildest nightmares. (Author)