Test Scoring provides a summary of traditional true score test theory and modern item response theory related to scoring tests, as well as novel developments resulting from the integration of these approaches. The background material introduced in the first four chapters builds a foundation for the new developments covered in later chapters. These new methods offer alternative psychometric approaches to scoring complex assessments. Each of the book's contributors draws from the classic literature of traditional test theory, as well as psychometric developments of the past decade. The emphasis is on large-scale educational measurement but the topics and procedures may be applied broadly within many measurement contexts. Numerous graphs and illustrative examples based on real tests and actual data are integrated throughout. This multi-authored volume shows the reader how to combine the coded outcomes on individual test items into a numerical summary about the examinee's performance. This book is intended for researchers and students in education and other social sciences interested in educational assessment and policy, the design and development of tests, and the procedures for test administration and scoring. Prerequisites include an introduction to educational and psychological measurement and basic statistics. Knowledge of differential and integral calculus and matrix algebra is helpful but not required.

This important volume examines the phenomena of cognition from an adaptive perspective. Rather than adhering to the typical practice in cognitive psychology of trying to predict behavior from a model of cognitive mechanisms, this book develops a number of models that successfully predict behavior from the structure of the environment to which cognition is adapted. The methodology -- called rational analysis -- involves specifying the information-processing goals of the system, the structure of the environment, and the computational constraints on the system, allowing predictions about behavior to be made by determining what behavior would be optimal under these assumptions. The Adaptive Character of Thought applies this methodology in great detail to four cognitive phenomena: memory, categorization, causal inference, and problem solving.

Originally published in 1979, the chapters in this volume summarize the available knowledge pertaining to a variety of functional - as opposed to explicitly organic - amnesias and disruptions of memory. Each chapter is written by an expert, and each author has attempted to integrate his area of inquiry into the contemporary body of theory and research on memory and cognition. Functional memory disorders may prove to be a significant testing ground for current theorizing, and the study of these phenomena may provide insights into memory and cognition that might be obscured in the usual sorts of laboratory investigations. The intent of the volume is to contribute to the development of a more comprehensive account of the processes involved in remembering and forgetting. The reader will find bold new treatments of repression and childhood amnesia, systematic explorations of certain experimental amnesias, and challenging analyses of the anomalies of everyday memory, in this ground-breaking work of the time.

This book represents the first attempt to historicise and theorise appeals for 'relevance' in psychology. It argues that the persistence of questions about the 'relevance' of psychology derives from the discipline's terminal inability to define its subject matter, its reliance on a socially disinterested science to underwrite its knowledge claims, and its consequent failure to address itself to the needs of a rapidly changing world. The chapters go on to consider the 'relevance' debate within South African psychology, by critically analysing discourse of forty-five presidential, keynote and opening addresses delivered at annual national psychology congresses between 1950 and 2011, and observes how appeals for 'relevance' were advanced by reactionary, progressive and radical psychologists alike. The book presents, moreover, the provocative thesis that the revolutionary quest for 'social relevance' that began in the 1960s has been supplanted by an ethic of 'market relevance' that threatens to isolate the discipline still further from the anxieties of broader society. With powerful interest groups continuing to co-opt psychologists without relent, this is a development that only psychologists of conscience can arrest.

This book presents an analysis of the correlation between the mind and the body, a complex topic of study and discussion by scientists and philosophers. Drawing largely on neuroscience and philosophy, the author utilizes the scientific method and incorporates lessons learned from a vast array of sources. Based on the most recent cutting-edge scientific discoveries on the Mind-Body problem, Tomasi presents a full examination of multiple fields related to neuroscience. The volume offers a scientist-based and student-friendly journey into medicine, psychology, artificial intelligence, embodied cognition, and social, ecological and anthropological models of perception, to discover our truest self.

This book brings together the latest literature and European experiences on preventing youth violent radicalisation and violent actions in intergroup relations. Youth violent radicalisation is a significant problem within the European context, and requires an exploration of how various social actors can play an active role in preventing radicalisation in minors and young adults. This complex issue needs to be explored through a multidisciplinary approach, and effective operational models are needed in order to tackle it. This book describes the theoretical framework for such an approach in all its facets. The book's originality lies in its psychosocial and participatory approach, aimed at improving results through professional training and community empowerment for building trusting relationships and educational activities. It also proposes "alternative narratives", which are a way of representing people and groups within a social context, thereby overcoming stereotyped visions and stigma. This book focuses on participation and communication among stakeholders, social inclusion, strengthening democratic values, and pursuing a proactive instead of a reactive approach to preventing radicalisation. Highly topical, the book will appeal to researchers and students of the social and behavioural sciences interested in youth radicalisation, including social work and social policy, as well as practitioners working within the juvenile justice system.

This practical guide is a must read for students interested in developing the attitudes, knowledge, skills, and values that foster positive relationships with people from diverse cultures both within and outside of the workplace. It contains real-life examples from students drawn from the authors' work across different countries. In an age of growing diversity and increasing global mobility, living and working with people from different cultural backgrounds is becoming the norm. To address this complex topic, the authors invite students to consider key questions such as: How do our cultural backgrounds influence our behavior towards others? What is intercultural competence and how can it help students to get along in work and life? How can institutions help students to develop intercultural competence? What does it have to do with topics like prejudice, discrimination, and racism? How can intercultural competence facilitate social change and help students to succeed in their careers? Written for students in any country and studying in any discipline, this book includes practical activities designed to help students to develop intercultural competence throughout their time at college or university. It is useful for students as an autonomous learning source, or as a resource for taught courses. Drawing on a comprehensive and rigorous knowledge of the field, the authors have written a thought-provoking analysis and a practical guide to understanding and enacting Intercultural Competence. I learnt from and admire their ambitious vision of the significance of intercultural competence for society and for the lives and careers of their readers.- Michael Byram, author of Teaching and Assessing Intercultural Communicative Competence, Durham University, UK This is a wonderfully readable book, which carefully and clearly explains the concept of intercultural competence, exploring its implications for addressing many of the most crucial issues facing the world today. Based on impeccable scholarship, and containing a wealth of practical activities, this book is highly recommended for students and interested laypeople alike.- Martyn Barrett, University of Surrey, UK An exceptionally user-friendly and theory-informed guidebook that would not only benefit university students but anyone with an interest in intercultural communication. The book is second to none in terms of clarity of presentation and coverage of concepts, models and practical ideas relevant to intercultural competence for the contemporary society. -Anwei Feng, University of Nottingham Ningbo, China An essential handbook and excellent addition to conventional textbooks. Nuanced and down-to-earth explanations about intercultural communication which are accessible to everyone. Insightful explanations for educators and students alike. Easy to use self-study guide with thought-provoking exercises. This book has been long needed and has come at just the right time. --Ivett Guntersdorfer, Founder and Director of the Intercultural Communication Certificate Program, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitat Munchen, Germany

Writing against the prevailing narrativization of suicide in terms of why it happened, Whitehead turns instead to the questions of when, how, and where, calling attention to suicide's materiality as well as its materialization. By turns provocative and deeply affecting, this book brings suicide into conversation with the critical medical humanities, extending beyond individual pathology and the medical institution to think about subjective and social perspectives, and to open up the various sites, scenes and interactions with which suicide is associated. Suicide is related forward from the point of death, rather than taking a retrospective view. Combining critical and textual analysis with personal reflection based on her own experience of her sister's suicide, Whitehead examines the days, months, and years following a death by suicide. This pivoting of attention to what happens in the wake of suicide brings to light the often-surprising ways in which suicide is woven into the everyday places that we inhabit, and in which it is related to all of us, albeit with varying degrees of proximity and kinship.

Expanding on the trailblazing ideas of Ellen Langer, this provocative volume explores the implications of critical mindfulness for making psychology more responsive and its practice more meaningful. Powerful critiques take the discipline to task for positioning therapists as experts over their clients and focusing on outcomes to the detriment of therapeutic process. Contributors use the principles of Langerian mindfulness to inform self-understanding and relationships, areas such as athletic performance and consumer decision making, and basic and complex forms of cognitive engagement. The mindfulness demonstrated here is not only critical but also creative, inclusive, and humane, with the potential to transform the consciousness of psychology and other mind-based fields. Included in the coverage: * Critical mindfulness of psychology's mindlessness. * The construct of mindfulness amidst and along conceptions of rationality. * Understanding confidence: its roots and role in performance. * Mindfulness in action: the emergence of distinctive thought and behavior. * Langerian mindfulness and optimal sport performance. * Health and the psychology of possibility. Critical Mindfulness is bracing and insightful reading for undergraduate and graduate students, psychologists, psychiatrists, physicians, clinicians, neurologists, and educators within and outside positive psychology. These pages challenge the wider community of professionals to rethink their perspectives on practice-as well as their long-held tenets of living.

This book examines the concept and practice of mentoring, as well as the wider scope and diversity of the mentoring that people can experience in their own life time. With each chapter dedicated to a specific level of mentoring, the book makes clear the impact and value of mentoring not only for the participants themselves but also on the situations in which mentoring occurs and the reverberations, positive and negative, on others outside this relationship. It shows the importance of relationships for people, individually and collectively and clarifies how relationships form the DNA for an inspiring, creative and professional life for the person and the community in which they engage. The book is about how support and skills can be transferred through mentoring to rebuild resilience through positive relationships and community; reconstructing them as we go.

This book intends to harvest insights from the discipline of Psychology, in its broad understanding, for application to International Relations. Although Psychology offers an abundance of theories that are useful for this purpose, they have so far remained largely untapped. In chapters on conflict, hegemony, terrorism, mental health, global consciousness, and peace proposals, Byer provides a synthesis of these two complimentary disciplines. This innovative volume presents the first contribution to the new discipline of International Political Psychology.

A methodologically innovative account of the role of women writers in the development of early psychological theory and practice in the long eighteenth century. Women writers played a central, but hitherto under-recognised, role in the development of the philosophy of mind and its practical outworkings in Romantic era England, Scotland and Ireland. This book focuses on the writings and lives of five leading figures - Anna Barbauld, Honora Edgeworth, Hannah More, Elizabeth Hamilton and Maria Edgeworth - a group of women who differed profoundly in their political, religious and social views but were nevertheless associated through correspondence, family ties and a shared belief in the importance of female education. It shows how through the philosophical language of materiality and embodiment that they developed and the 'enlightened domesticity' that they espoused they transformed educational practice and made substantial interventions into the social reformist politics of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Alive to the manifold overlaps between emotional, and often religious, experience and experiment in the developing science of mind at this time, the book illuminates the potential and the limits of domestic Enlightenment, particularly in projects of moral and industrial 'improvement' and casts new light on a wide variety of other fields: the history of science, early psychology and religion, reformist politics and Romanticism, and how all these reflected the political and social fallout of the French Revolution in the first years of the nineteenth century. JOANNA WHARTON is an Early Career Fellow at Lichtenberg-Kolleg, the Goettingen Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences.

This volume provides an overview of the theoretical and empirical work on relationship-induced self-concept change that has occurred over the last 10-15 years. The chapters in this volume discuss the foundations of relationship self-change, how and when it occurs, how it influences relationship decisions and behavior, and how it informs and modifies subsequent knowledge structures, all examined over the course of the relationship cycle (i.e., initiation, maintenance, and dissolution). Additionally, this volume identifies novel applications and extensions of the relationship self-change literature, including applications to health and behavior, intergroup relations, and the workplace. Among the topics discussed: Self-disclosure in the acquaintance process Commitment readiness Bolstering attachment security through close relationships Self-concept clarity and self-change The role of social support in promoting self-development Relationship dissolution and self-concept change Intergroup and sociocultural factors of self-expansion Self-concept change at work Measurement of relationship-induced self-concept change Interpersonal Relationships and the Self-Concept serves both as a comprehensive overview of the existing empirical research as well as a roadmap for future research on self-change, including a discussion of emerging theoretical frameworks. It will interest researchers focusing on romantic relationships, self and identity, and the intersection of self and relationships, spanning the disciplines of psychology, sociology, communication, and family studies.

This volume offers insights into contemporary trends and perspectives in psychobiographical research. It applys new theoretical and methodological frameworks and presents discourses on psychobiography from transdisciplinary backgrounds and various socio-cultural contexts, displaying the new state-of-the-art, new trends and themes in psychobiography. The book outlines psychobiography's outstanding contribution to psychology from 36 internationally reputable authors. It also presents the ideas of five outstanding psychobiographers through interview excerpts. This book is a must for researchers, lecturers and practitioners in the field of psychology and social sciences interested in the use of new psychological theories and methodologies in life-span research.

The advancement of knowledge concerning the complexities of human intellective processes can best be achieved by combining theory and research from the disciplines of cognitive psychology and artificial intelligence. Wagman explores various aspects of these disciplines to further his ideas. He examines the nature of the human intellect and proposes a theory of representation and intelligence that is applicable to human, computer, and animal cognition. He also evaluates theory and research concerned with structure and process in human reasoning and human problem solving. Several scientific discovery systems including BACON, FARENHEIT, and IDS are described in depth. The ability of these systems to emulate solutions to 10 types of scientific problems is examined. The capacity theory of language comprehension is also presented and extended to the domain of cognitive processes.

African Americans have come a long way in the difficult upward struggle from slavery to the relatively broad freedoms enjoyed today. Together, as a potent and well-knit group, they have battled endlessly in their march toward freedom. Finally, according to psychologist James Davison Jr, the last step to freedom for black Americans has arrived. But, that last step must be taken as individuals - not as a collective. In this assessment of the problems and potentials facing African Americans, Dr Davison argues that in order for achieving individuals to advance to the final step of freedom, they must break free from the mental shackles created by the black community.The central theme of "Sweet Release" is that the forces that impinge most upon psychological freedom for black Americans come from within. Guilt for being successful, shame in reaction to the misbehaviours of race peers, demands to give back to the community, and accusations of trying to be white are just a few of the mechanisms that thwart psychological freedom for black persons. Dr Davison argues that individual lifestyles, aspirations, even identities are constrained by the spectre of racial unity. As a result, for black advancers, what remains to be overcome is not 'the system' or 'them', but internalised community attitudes that put a choke hold on individual freedom. Unafraid of controversy or candid assessment, Dr Davison addresses these and other thorny issues with psychological insight while offering strategies to move beyond group constrictions toward personal freedom.