To resolve the dispute amongst several studies, this research investigated whether the new generation of women engineering majors, who have been better academically prepared and presumably instilled with confidence, still experience lower levels of achievement than male engineering students. This study was framed under Bandura's (1986) triadic…

Factors affecting the student use of a course management system in a web-enhanced course are investigated using the technology acceptance model. Represented in the present study is the second phase of the analysis, with a focus on the causal relationship of subjective norms to student attitudes towards WebCT and their effect on three dependent…

Based on studies carried out on qualitative data an instrument was constructed for investigating how larger numbers of students handle graphics. This test, consisting of 18 pages, each with its own graphic display(s) and a set of tasks, was distributed to 363 students, 15-16 years of age, from five different schools. The format of the questions…

In the No Child Left Behind Act and the What Works Clearinghouse, the federal government has attempted to establish guidelines for the type of education research that U.S. schools should consider in selecting instructional programs and resources. The government's clear preference for the medical model--a powerful research design in such fields as…

This study investigated the role of metacognition as a mediator of the effect of test anxiety on a surface approach to studying. The following scales were completed by 109 undergraduate social sciences students: Approaches and Study Skills Inventories for Students (ASSIST), Metacognitions Questionnaire (MCQ), and Test Anxiety Scale (TAS). Positive…

The effects of anger feelings (rated by the State-Trait Anger Expression Inventory) and witnessing family violence on anxiety and depression (rated by the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale) were examined in 457 junior high school students. Anxiety and depression scores were correlated with frequencies of witnessing family violence. In a…

Recent theoretical advances in working memory guided analyses of cognitive measures in 122 children with dyslexia and their 200 affected biological parents in families with a multigenerational history of dyslexia. Both children and adults were most severely impaired, on average, in three working memory components- phonological word-form storage,…

A computerized adaptive test (CAT) may be modeled as a closed-loop system, where item selection is influenced by trait level ([theta]) estimation and vice versa. When discrepancies exist between an examinee's estimated and true [theta] levels, nonoptimal item selection is a likely result. Nevertheless, examinee response behavior consistent with…

Beside interindividual social comparisons, intraindividual dimensional comparisons in which students compare their achievements in one subject with their achievements in other subjects have an impact on their academic self-concepts. The internal/external frame of reference (I/E) model by Marsh (1986) assumes that dimensional comparisons lead to…

Reports of adolescents' coping with recurrent pain, symptoms of anxiety/depression, and somatic complaints were obtained from a sample of 164 adolescents with recurrent abdominal pain and their parents. Confirmatory factor analysis revealed that coping consisted of 3 nonorthogonal factors: Primary Control Engagement Coping (problem solving,…

The authors describe 2 efficiency (planned missing data) designs for measurement: the 3-form design and the 2-method measurement design. The 3-form design, a kind of matrix sampling, allows researchers to leverage limited resources to collect data for 33% more survey questions than can be answered by any 1 respondent. Power tables for estimating…

The goals of this study were to (a) develop an empirically based model regarding the development of fluent and automatic reading in the early elementary school years and (b) determine whether fluent text-reading skills provided benefits for reading comprehension beyond those accounted for by fluent word decoding. First-, second-, and third-grade…

Research in structured equation modeling (SEM) suggests that nonnormal data will invalidate chi-square tests and produce erroneous standard errors. However, much remains unknown about the extent to which, and the conditions under which nonnormal data can affect SEM application, especially when excessive skewness and kurtosis are present in data.…

The multiplicity of variables describing the financial conditions of postsecondary institutions makes it difficult to assess changes in higher education finance from year to year and to find the relationship between these finance variables and average faculty salaries. This study sought to determine if a small number of factors could be derived to…

Uses structural equation modeling to combine traditional ideas from repeated-measures ANOVA with some traditional ideas from longitudinal factor analysis. The model describes a latent growth curve model that permits the estimation of parameters representing individual and group dynamics. (Author/RH)