Mark G. Pfeiffer

Teaching Performance Criterion Development Through Scaling: Teacher-Student Points-of-View Analysis.

30 operational tasks of psychology professors were scaled by the 14 students and 10 of the 14 faculty of the same department using an adaptation of the pair comparisons method. The stimuli, in the form of operational statements of classroom teacher activities, were compared two at a time by Ss who made judgments in terms of the amount of similarity between activities. These judgments were then transformed into correlation coefficients and factor analysed. Factorial congruence between faculty and student judgments was demonstrated. The classroom activities of the psychology professors at the urban college may be described in terms of 8 basic dimensions: “Knowledge Dissemination,” “Teacher Dynamism,” “Classroom Administration,” “Control of Student Behavior,” “Environmental Regulation,” “Advisory Guidance,” “Information Dissemination,” and “Teacher-Student Feedback.”

MENTAL WORK CRITERION DEVELOPMENT THROUGH SCALING: A TECHNIQUE FOR DETERMINING THE INTELLECTIVE STRUCTURE OF THE COLLEGE PROFESSOR'S JOB

A classification of the intellective requirements of eight classroom performance factors of university-level psychology teachers is presented. Guilfords Structure-of-the-Intellect model was employed as an intellective referent. The magnitude estimation scales derived from faculty and students at German and American psychology departments showed high agreement.

Model Development and the Assessment of Competing Models

The paper describes the process of model development and applies multiattribute utility theory to the practical problem of optimizing the selection among competing models designed for the same purpose. As an example, two models (Human Interactive and Monte Carlo) are compared which differ on the basis of their existing levels of abstraction, or their degree of remoteness from the real world. The slight superiority of the Monte Carlo Model resulted largely because it had higher utilities for the more important attributes of models such as repeatability of output, degree of error/low variability, and feasibility of use and application.

TECHNIQUE FOR ESTIMATING TASK COMPLETION TIME FROM PARTIAL DATA

Estimates of task completion time are required to develop production programs, maintenance schedules, and prediction systems. Acquiring such data, when the information is not available in data banks, requires time-consuming and costly observations of task performance. An alternative to direct time-study observation is judgment by a skilled person. An efficient technique for making estimates of task-execution time, along with supporting reliability and validity data, is presented.

APPLICATION OF SIGNAL DETECTION THEORY TO EVALUATE PERSONNEL USING A BEHAVIORAL LEVELS SYSTEM

Signal detection theory was applied to evaluate the sensitivity of 15 staff workers while classifying maturity levels of children at a childrens home. Stimulus materials were provided to each staff worker in a packet of 30 scenarios describing the behavior of the 30 resident children. The scenarios were then classified by the staff workers into five maturity levels and a confidence rating in the accuracy of each classification was made. A response conditional rating analysis was employed to treat the data. Best performing staff did not exhibit greater confidence in their classifications than did their poorer performing counterparts. Many staff were insensitive to the accuracy of their classifications. Suggestions for improving performance were developed from the results.

Comparison of Category and Magnitude Scales of Technical Skills

Magnitude and category scaling methods were employed by journeymen electronics personnel to scale the apparent complexity of various aspects of their own job. The resultant data indicated that essentially equivalent scales were produced across the methods and that the continua of perceived complexity of 4 “activity” stimuli and of 16 “circuit” stimuli were metathetic. Since the distortions as the result of the introduction of different scaling methods were minimal, the present data suggested support for a single psychophysical law in the avionics job performance area.

Visual orientation in three-dimensional space.

A molar hypothesis concerning visual orientation in three-dimensional space was developed, which considered the task variables and perceptual variables. The key word was synthesis. It was predicted that synthesis (integration) of visual stimuli in varying degrees was required for accurate perception of displacement, velocity, and acceleration. The quality and quantity of this integrative process and its locus were expounded to explain the facts of visual space orientation.