This qualitative study aims to reveal pre-service English language teachers' perceptions concerning 'teaching English to young learners' through metaphors. It has been carried out with the participation of 83 4th grade undergraduate students attending the English Language Teaching Programme at Ondokuz Mayis University. The data have been collected…

This study conducted a development and validation of a vignette-based grit scale (Grit-V). The purpose was to determine if the use of vignettes provided more validity evidence than short simple-sentence item endorsements. The data were gathered from a sample population of undergraduate students from The University of Alabama. Focus group data were…

Students decide to remain enrolled in community college more so during their first-year of matriculation, than at any other point in their education. For the last three decades, community college leaders across the United States have been challenged by stagnant retention rates that hover around 60% (Mortenson, 2012). While Latino college students…

Sexual violence is a substantial problem on college campuses, particularly for undergraduate women who consistently report higher rates of nonconsensual sexual contact and sexual harassment during their college careers when compared to the general student population. A wide range of mental and behavioral health concerns are associated with sexual…

The study was carried out to construct a valid and reliable test in Economics for secondary school students. Two research questions were drawn to guide the establishment of validity and reliability for the Economics Achievement Test (EAT). It is a multiple choice objective test of five options with 100 items. A sample of 1000 students was randomly…

Smoking-related outcome expectation and self-efficacy have been found to be associated with adolescent smoking initiation. There is, however, a lack of appropriate instruments to investigate early adolescents' smoking outcome expectations and antismoking self-efficacy. The purpose of this study was to develop and validate the Smoking Outcome…

This paper reports the development and validation of a short Use of Creative Cognition Scale in Studying (UCCS) that was inspired by the Cognitive Processes Associated with Creativity (CPAC) scale. In Study 1, items from two of the six subscales of the CPAC were excluded due to conceptual and psychometric issues to create a 21-item CPAC scale,…

Do "generic" skills such as critical thinking and written communication matter in the workplace? A recent study indicates that, in addition to a student's major in college and the selectivity of an institution, better performance on an assessment of critical-thinking and written-communication skills is associated with higher rates of…

This paper summarises a doctoral research project aimed at advancing professional practice in organisation consulting. I explore what the term 'flourishing' means in a consultant-client relationship, and how such a bond develops. Using a phenomenological methodology (Moustakas, 1994), I draw on conversations with consultants to describe the…

In this commentary, Kuhn and Ranger hypothesize that most people are aware that talent does not guarantee success in case one is lazy. This is also true for the performance in achievement tests that depends on, among other factors, achievement potential (ability) and willingness to achieve (test-taking motivation) of the test taker. They add that…

This commentary focuses on the challenging views and creative insights inspired by the four articles in this special issue of the journal. The studies have integrated creativity research with social psychological and cultural perspectives. I have highlighted the unique contribution of how Karwowski, Tanggaard, Glaveanu, and Hennessey have each…

One approach to validating assessment scores involves evaluating the ability of scores to discriminate among groups who differ in a specific characteristic, such as training status (in education) or disease state (in clinical applications). Such known-groups comparison studies provide validity evidence of "relationships with other…

The term "validity" is one of the most important and one of the most debated concepts in educational measurement. In this paper, I argue that various different approaches can all be viewed from an associational perspective. I also argue that our understanding will be enhanced by adopting some basic ideas of scientific reasoning to the…

Throughout the world, tests are administered to some examinees who are not fully proficient in the language in which they are being tested. It has long been acknowledged that proficiency in the language in which a test is administered often affects examinees' performance on a test. Depending on the context and intended uses for a particular…

Purpose: Our understanding of test construction has improved since the now-classic review by McCauley and Swisher (1984) . The current review article examines the psychometric characteristics of current single-word tests of speech sound production in an attempt to determine whether our tests have improved since then. It also provides a resource…