The University of Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland (UBLS) is a regional four-year liberal arts university influenced by the British educational system. Admission to UBLS is contingent on: (1) scoring high on the Cambridge Overseas School Certificate (COSC), (2) scoring high on the General Certificate of Education (GCE) Examination, (3) scoring high…

This article presents views of proponents and opponents to standardized tests, isolates the major weakness of testing--questionable validity--and offers several recommendations for the betterment of test development and use. Some major misuses of tests include the following: (a) tests are at times administered with no clear purpose; (b) test…

More suitable criteria was needed to evaluate "mature" students or those over 21 who had not completed all senior matriculation requirements for admission to the University of Lethbridge. This study was designed to compare the performance of "mature" students and several groups of regularly admitted freshmen on the College…

Many self-concept measures employ several different scales to which the subject responds in a set order at one sitting. This study examined the effects of different testing conditions on such scales. Bill's Index of Adjustment and Values was administered to 191 graduate students under two different sequences, and two time delay conditions. The…

A potentially valuable measure of overconfidence on probabilistic multiple-choice tests was evaluated. The measure of overconfidence was based on probabilistic responses to nonsense items embedded in a vocabulary test. The test was administered under both confidence response and conventional choice response directions to 208 undergraduate…

The theme of the 1970 Invitational Conference on Testing Problems was "The Promise and Perils of Educational Information Systems." The following papers were presented: (1) "Longer Education: Thinner, Broader, or Higher" by Fritz Machlup; (2) "Testing: Americans' Comfortable Panacea" by Theodore R. Sizer; (3) "Social and Cultural Change and the…

The 1965 meeting of the Western Regional Conference on Testing Problems dealt with change in education. The following speeches were presented: (1) "The Winds of Change in Mathematics Education with a Discussion of Some of the Stronger Gusts" by Sheldon S. Myers; (2) "Articulation Problems in California Foreign Language Instruction" by Kai-yu Hsu;…

Companies have been accused of using tests as a means of maintaining unfair discrimination against groups which have already suffered from many forms of discrimination. It does not follow, however, that tests themselves merit condemnation. Employers who use tests do so because the information furnished by tests is valuable to them in making hiring…

Deficiences in the field of psychological testing associated with the assessment of vocational aptitudes are considered. The rationale for a new approach designed to obviate these deficiences is given. A description of the procedures which provide for implementation of the new approach and the semi-automated Performance Assessment System (PAS) is…

This symposium paper describes 2 experiments in which the principles of observational learning were applied in school settings to the treatment of 2 separate groups of test-anxious junior high school students. The first experiment was designed to test the assumption that the counter-conditioning responses thought to occur in systematic…

Specially constructed "speeded" and "unspeeded" forms of a Reading Comprehension section of the Law School Admission Test (LSAT) were administered to regular center and fee-free center LSAT candidates in an effort to determine: (1) if the test was more speeded for fee-free candidates, and (2) if reducing the amount of…

The Learning Potential Test was administered three times to samples of bright, dull normal, and educable mentally retarded (EMR) children. Training in relevant problem solving strategies was interpolated following the second administration to separate the effects of practice and coaching. As hypothesized, lower-class dull normal and EMR subjects…

The sequence of development as hypothesized by Piaget has been confirmed for various groups of children by cross-sectional and longitudinal studies. Such consistency has increased interest in constructing scales based on Piaget's theory according to psychometric principles. Three major problems are discussed which present definite obstacles in the…

Two existing measures of occupation that seem to be useful for investigating social status are described and compared. Modifications are suggested on the basis of extensive investigation of the dimensions of social stratification. Hollingshead scale classifies occupations into seven categories. Because the coder must classify unlisted occupations…

Reported are the proceedings and recommendations of a research conference to improve the development and utilization of intelligence tests for use with blind adults in social and vocational rehabilitation. The following tests are considered: A Haptic Intelligence Scale for the Adult Blind, the Raven Progressive Matrices for Presentation to the…