Charles T. Myers

Evaluation of Group and Individual Forms of Embedded-Figures Measures of Field-Independence 1

(1950) Embedded-Figures Test (EFT) ; second, to study the roles of various response determinants, including the influence of memory, color, and item format upon individual consistencies in the extraction of embedded figures; and third, to appraise relationships between performance on group and individual embedded-figures tests and selected cognitive and personality measures. Interest in studying perceptual field-independence and its ramifications in personality theory, development, and cognition has grown steadily since the appearance of a report describing a decade of research by Witkin and his associates (Witkin et al., 1954). At

Item Rearrangement Under Typical Test Conditions

THE purpose of this study was to investigate the following question : If the items which compose a test are presented in one arrangement to one group, and the same items are then rearranged into a different sequence and administered to another group, can it be said that the two groups have taken the same test? The answer has some quite practical implications. Under crowded group testing conditions there is the possibility that neighboring answer sheets will be visible to a person taking the test. If the items in adjacent copies of the test have been rearranged, however, the importance of this visibility is considerably reduced. Previous studies of this problem include those by MacNicol (1956) and Mollenkopf (1950). The MacNicol study investigated the effects of changing an easy-to-hard arrangement of item difficulties to either (1) a random arrangement, or (2) a hard-to-easy arrangement, under nearly pure power conditions. The results indicated that the hard-to-easy arrangement was significantly more difficult, but that the random arrangement was not significantly different from the original test. Individual item difficulties remained about the same regardless of arrangement. The Mollenkopf study investigated the effects of rearrangement on the item statistics only, and it compared the changes under either power or highly speeded conditions. He found that the values of item indices p,

A Note on a Spatial Relations Pretest and Posttest

test were found to be considerably higher than scores for the first administration to the same group when the same test was given before and after a course in engineering drawing and descriptive geometry. It was also found that scores for both administrations of the test had equally high correlations with the course grade although the second administration scores were restricted in range and negatively skewed. It is regretted that

A Short Tour of Book Publishing for Political Scientists

gument, but too often the question investigated is too narrow, or a demonstration of the candidates scholarly knowledge or methodological wizardry dominates. The objective of a dissertation is to prove to the candidates faculty that the student has learned how to conduct a research project, understands the methods employed in the field, has read the relevant literature, and can communicate the results of that research