Transforming the Measurement of Learning and Teaching in Higher Education proposes a dynamic new model for educational measurement by reconceptualizing the field of learning analytics. Revolving around the agency and daily work of those in the field, this book describes how colleges and universities can be better structured for quality learning, showcases new tools for gathering emergent feedback, and demonstrates how that feedback can be used effectively across higher education organizations. Leaders and practitioners at all levels are offered new approaches for organizational and technological design that ensure the type of data and the way it is gathered serve the ultimate goal of high quality learning and teaching.

Signal detection theory--as developed in electrical engineering and based on statistical decision theory--was first applied to human sensory discrimination 40 years ago. The theoretical intent was to provide a valid model of the discrimination process; the methodological intent was to provide reliable measures of discrimination acuity in specific sensory tasks. An analytic method of detection theory, called the relative operating characteristic (ROC), can isolate the effect of the placement of the decision criterion, which may be variable and idiosyncratic, so that a pure measure of intrinsic discrimination acuity is obtained. For the past 20 years, ROC analysis has also been used to measure the discrimination acuity or inherent accuracy of a broad range of practical diagnostic systems. It was widely adopted by methodologists in the field of information retrieval, is increasingly used in weather forecasting, and is the generally preferred method in clinical medicine, primarily in radiology. This book attends to both themes, ROC analysis in the psychology laboratory and in practical diagnostic settings, and to their essential unity. The focus of this book is on detection and recognition as fundamental tasks that underlie most complex behaviors. As defined here, they serve to distinguish between two alternative, confusable stimulus categories, which may be perceptual or cognitive categories in the psychology laboratory, or different states of the world in practical diagnostic tasks. This book on signal detection theory in psychology was written by one of the developers of the theory, who co-authored with D.M. Green the classic work published in this area in 1966 (reprinted in 1974 and 1988). This volume reviews the history of the theory in engineering, statistics, and psychology, leading to the separate measurement of the two independent factors in all discrimination tasks, discrimination acuity and decision criterion. It extends the previous book to show how in several areas of psychology--in vigilance and memory--what had been thought to be discrimination effects were, in reality, effects of a changing criterion. The book shows that data plotted in terms of the relative operating characteristic have essentially the same form across the wide range of discrimination tasks in psychology. It develops the implications of this ROC form for measures of discrimination acuity, pointing up the valid ones and identifying several common, but invalid, ones. The area under the binormal ROC is seen to be supported by the data; the popular measures d' and percent correct are not. An appendix describes the best, current programs for fitting ROCs and estimating their parameters, indices, and standard errors. The application of ROC analysis to diagnostic tasks is also described. Diagnostic accuracy in a wide range of tasks can be expressed in terms of the ROC area index. Choosing the appropriate decision criterion for a given diagnostic setting--rather than considering some single criterion to be natural and fixed--has a major impact on the efficacy of a diagnostic process or system. Illustrated here by separate chapters are diagnostic systems in radiology, information retrieval, aptitude testing, survey research, and environments in which imminent dangerous conditions must be detected. Data from weather forecasting, blood testing, and polygraph lie detection are also reported. One of these chapters describes a general approach to enhancing the accuracy of diagnostic systems.

Presenting the proceedings of a conference held at Syracuse University in honor of S.S. Stevens, a pioneer in the scaling of sensory magnitudes and the originator of the method of magnitude estimation, this volume brings together the work of 20 authorities on the procedures of ratio scaling. These experts--psychophysicists, physiologists, and theoreticians--offer their views on whether or not psychological magnitudes can be measured and whether the judgments of psychological magnitudes constitute the basis for the construction of a ratio scale. Also discussed is the question of whether any single method could stand out as a potential standard technique for measuring psychological magnitudes.

This classic volume outlines, for both students and professionals, the mathematical theories and equations that are necessary for evaluating a test and for quantifying its characteristics. The author utilizes formulas that evaluate both the reliability and the validity of tests. He also provides the means for evaluating the reliability and validity of total test scores and individual item analysis. The work remains one of the only books on classical test theory to discuss applications, "true score" theory, the effect of test length on reliability and validity, and the effects of univariate and multivariate selection on validity.

This book declines to take for granted the widespread assumption that existing psychometric procedures provide scientific measurement. The currently fashionable concepts of measurement within psychology -- operationalism and representationalism -- are critically examined, and the classical view, that measurement is the assessment of quantity, is defended. Within this framework, it is shown how conjoint measurement can be used to test the hypothesis that variables are quantitative. This theme is developed in detail using familiar psychological examples, such as Thurstone's law of comparative judgment, multidimensional scaling, and Coombs' theory of unfolding.

Originally published in 1987, this book presents papers from the First Conference of European Clinical Psychologists, held at the University of Kent Canterbury in July of that year. It shows some of the most exciting and recent developments in research and innovations in professional practice from many European countries with an overall theme of the WHO strategy of 'Health for all by the year 2000.' The whole range of clinical psychology is covered, including: cognitive therapy, clinical psychology and WHO strategy, the mental health of ethnic minority groups, health psychology, care in the community, and many other topics. The book is likely to be of interest for anyone concerned with the recent history and policies in clinical psychology.

Methodological Problems with the Academic Sources of Popular Psychology: Context, Inference, and Measurement examines the relationship between academic and popular psychology from a critical perspective with a focus on issues of methodology. The monograph traces the path from ideas in reputable popular psychology back to the original academic research tradition from which the claims were generated. It also addresses the conceptual and methodological controversies with respect to the original research typically ignored or played down in popular writing. This book covers a range of topics including the question of universal biases in judgment, resurgent notions of "fast" thinking and a cognitive unconscious, the psychology of happiness and other "positive" psychologies, the effects of parenting on child outcomes, and more general issues related to psychological tests and measures. The methodological problems that emerge include problems with generalizing from specific experimental conditions, highly biased sampling, lack of replication of findings, lack of shared referents across subfields, even different authors, as well as confusion around basic statistical and mathematical issues. Methodological Problems with the Academic Sources of Popular Psychology: Context, Inference, and Measurement reviews these issues extensively, offering both a sense of the history and pervasiveness of these issues in the field itself and an opportunity to review and master these difficult ideas.

Originally published in 1979, this title represents a summary of 17 years of research centring around the Sensation Seeking Scale (SSS) and the theory from which the test was derived. Now an integral part of personality testing, including adaptations for use with children, this reissue is a chance to see where it all began.

Appreciation of the beauty and complexity of the human mind when perceiving an ambiguous stimulus led Dr. Hermann Rorschach to develop his scientific method eighty years ago. Full of gratitude for his brief life and work, the editors hope this volume will stand as an idiographic testament to his brilliance for the Rorschach students of the future. The contributors are clearly the most notable Rorschach clinicians in practice, and their work integrates the Comprehensive System and psychoanalytic methods. This book is organized into four sections. Within each of the first three sections -- devoted to psychotic, borderline, and neurotic disorders respectively -- the editors and invited authors have contributed Rorschach case studies which vertically cut a character pathology, personality disorder, or clinical diagnosis through a particular level of personality organization. The last section charts the enormously varied course that Rorschach work can navigate -- from the understanding of a Nobel laureate, the pain of trauma and transexuality, and the Nazi perversion of youth, to the consensus Rorschach in couple's therapy and cutting edge work in neuropsychology.

Philosophical and Empirical Approaches to Psychology: Mentalism vs. Anti-Mentalism philosophically analyzes four different approaches to psychology: introspectionism, behaviourism, cognitive psychology, and cognitive neuroscience to explore the concept of "the mind," which developed from the late nineteenth and early twentieth century up through present day psychology. The resulting ideas originating from these approaches are divided into two main groups in this book, mentalism (whose supporters assume that mind is not reducible to something else) and anti-mentalism (whose supporters assume that mind is indeed reducible to something else). This book argues that adopting one idea over another can have a profound influence in a psychologist's research. Further, the author shows that some controversial psychological notions like "consciousness" pertain to a particular mentalistic approach. Many psychologists do not consider such notions scientific, but he argues that this depends upon their adherence to a certain anti-mentalistic approach or to a specific mentalistic perspective. The book examines these issues by assessing experimental psychology in relation to neurobiology and philosophy, offering an integration of philosophical and theoretical chapters along with empirical and experimental chapters. Theoretically, the arguments draw from philosophy of psychology and experimental psychology. Using empirical research, Philosophical and Empirical Approaches to Psychology examines the role of the various mentalistic and anti-mentalistic approaches to psychology by integrating epistemological analysis and empirical research.

Want to master research methods in psychology? Look no further! Written with new students in mind, this book will help you understand and apply research methods to every part of your degree. It will help you develop your critical and analytical skills by making features of key issues such as ethics and cultural context. It aims to entertain with interesting facts, and will enhance your understanding with examples of real studies. Other features include: Skoolkid errors Ig Nobel Prize Whoa there! and are all designed to make the study of methods enjoyable and easy.

This new volume is the first to focus entirely on automated essay scoring and evaluation. It is intended to provide a comprehensive overview of the evolution and state-of-the-art of automated essay scoring and evaluation technology across several disciplines, including education, testing and measurement, cognitive science, computer science, and computational linguistics. The development of this technology has led to many questions and concerns. Automated Essay Scoring attempts to address some of these questions including: *How can automated scoring and evaluation supplement classroom instruction? *How does the technology actually work? *Can it improve students' writing? *How reliable is the technology? *How can these computing methods be used to develop evaluation tools? *What are the state-of the-art essay evaluation technologies and automated scoring systems? Divided into four parts, the first part reviews the teaching of writing and how computers can contribute to it. Part II analyzes actual automated essay scorers including e-raterTM, Intellimetric, and the Intelligent Essay Assessor. The third part analyzes related psychometric issues, and the final part reviews innovations in the field. This book is ideal for researchers and advanced students interested in automated essay scoring from the fields of testing and measurement, education, cognitive science, language, and computational linguistics.

The editors of this volume suggest that there are missing elements in the conceptualization upon which standard test theory is based. Those elements are models for just how people know what they know and do what they can do, and the ways in which they increase these capacities. Different models are useful for different purposes; therefore, broader or alternative student models may be appropriate. The chapters in this volume consider a variety of directions in which standard test theory might be extended. Topics covered include: the role of test theory in light of recent work in cognitive and educational psychology, test design, student modeling, test analysis, and the integration of assessment and instruction.

This book provides a definitive empirical study of antisocial character pathology and its assessment through the use of the Rorschach. Drawing upon a decade of research with nearly 400 individuals in various hospitals and prisons, the authors paint an extraordinary intrapsychic picture of the personality structure and psychodynamics of these troublesome patients. Serving as both an educational tool and a reference text, this book presents: * Rorschach data on several different antisocial groups -- conduct disordered children and adolescents, antisocial personality disordered adult males with and without schizophrenia, antisocial adult females, and male and female sexual homicide perpetrators; * nomothetic (group) and idiographic (case study) data; * data which have been analyzed and theoretically interpreted using both structural methods and psychoanalytic approaches which represent the cutting edge of Rorschach theory and practice; and * a developmental approach in analyzing Rorschach data gathered from antisocial children, adolescents, and adults -- providing striking similarities. This is the first Rorschach database of this type that has ever been published. As such, it serves as a valuable reference text for Rorschach users -- providing a definitive empirical base, theoretical integration, and a focus on individuals who create severe problems for society.

This engaging book helps readers identify and then discard 52 misconceptions about data and statistical summaries. The focus is on major concepts contained in typical undergraduate and graduate courses in statistics, research methods, or quantitative analysis. Interactive Internet exercises that further promote undoing the misconceptions are found on the book's website. The author's accessible discussion of each misconception has five parts: The Misconception - a brief description of the misunderstanding Evidence that the Misconception Exists - examples and claimed prevalence Why the Misconception is Dangerous - consequence of having the misunderstanding Undoing the Misconception - how to think correctly about the concept Internet Assignment - an interactive activity to help readers gain a firm grasp of the statistical concept and overcome the misconception. The book's statistical misconceptions are grouped into 12 chapters that match the topics typically taught in introductory/intermediate courses. However, each of the 52 discussions is self-contained, thus allowing the misconceptions to be covered in any order without confusing the reader. Organized and presented in this manner, the book is an ideal supplement for any standard textbook. An ideal supplement for undergraduate and graduate courses in statistics, research methods, or quantitative analysis taught in psychology, education, business, nursing, medicine, and the social sciences. The book also appeals to independent researchers interested in undoing their statistical misconceptions.

Since the mid-80s several laboratories around the world have been developing techniques for the operational use of tests derived from item-generation. According to the experts, the major thrust of test development in the next decade will be the harnessing of item generation technology to the production of computer developed tests. This is expected to revolutionize the way in which tests are constructed and delivered. This book is a compilation of the papers presented at a symposium held at ETS in Princeton, attended by the world's foremost experts in item-generation theory and practice. Its goal is to present the major applications of cognitive principles in the construction of ability, aptitude, and achievement tests. It is an intellectual contribution to test development that is unique, with great potential for changing the ways tests are generated. The intended market includes professional educators and psychologists interested in test generation.

The amount of data in our world has been exploding, and analyzing large data sets-so called big data-will become a key basis of competition in business. Statisticians and researchers will be updating their analytic approaches, methods and research to meet the demands created by the availability of big data. The goal of this book is to show how advances in data science have the ability to fundamentally influence and improve organizational science and practice. This book is primarily designed for researchers and advanced undergraduate and graduate students in psychology, management and statistics.

The amount of data in our world has been exploding, and analyzing large data sets-so called big data-will become a key basis of competition in business. Statisticians and researchers will be updating their analytic approaches, methods and research to meet the demands created by the availability of big data. The goal of this book is to show how advances in data science have the ability to fundamentally influence and improve organizational science and practice. This book is primarily designed for researchers and advanced undergraduate and graduate students in psychology, management and statistics.

Analysis of Variance, Design, and Regression: Linear Modeling for Unbalanced Data, Second Edition presents linear structures for modeling data with an emphasis on how to incorporate specific ideas (hypotheses) about the structure of the data into a linear model for the data. The book carefully analyzes small data sets by using tools that are easily scaled to big data. The tools also apply to small relevant data sets that are extracted from big data. New to the Second Edition Reorganized to focus on unbalanced data Reworked balanced analyses using methods for unbalanced data Introductions to nonparametric and lasso regression Introductions to general additive and generalized additive models Examination of homologous factors Unbalanced split plot analyses Extensions to generalized linear models R, Minitab (R), and SAS code on the author's website The text can be used in a variety of courses, including a yearlong graduate course on regression and ANOVA or a data analysis course for upper-division statistics students and graduate students from other fields. It places a strong emphasis on interpreting the range of computer output encountered when dealing with unbalanced data.

Behavioral medicine has now matured as a field to the point where all recognize that different populations are presented with different issues. Psychological reactions and patterns affect the health and well-being of children, as well as adults, and numerous standardized instruments for the assessment of a variety of areas of children's functioning are currently available. Yet, it can be difficult for practitioners and researchers searching through general compendia of resources for child assessment--which are frequently focused on general techniques rather than specific instruments--to identify the optimal ones to meet their particular needs and to choose among them.
This practical and comprehensive reference guide is the first to sort, present, and review all the measures that can be used to evaluate the behavioral, cognitive, and emotional aspects of children's health. It organizes the measures under eight general headings, such as quality of life, adherence, pain management, and patient satisfaction. Each chapter begins with a leading authority's overview of the underlying theoretical construct and any concerns about how to measure it. Descriptions and reviews of relevant instruments follow; these include information on administration, scoring, psychometric properties, and ordering, as well as comments by the instruments' developers.
"Assessing Children's Well-Being: A Handbook of Measures" will be welcomed by all those professionals and scientists who seek to assess and effectively address the complex interactions between physical health and mental health in children.

In this collection, international contributors come together to discuss how qualitative and quantitative methods can be used in psychotherapy research. The book considers the advantages and disadvantages of each approach, and recognises how each method can enhance our understanding of psychotherapy. Divided into two parts, the book begins with an examination of quantitative research and discusses how we can transfer observations into numbers and statistical findings. Chapters on quantitative methods cover the development of new findings and the improvement of existing findings, identifying and analysing change, and using meta-analysis. The second half of the book comprises chapters considering how qualitative and mixed methods can be used in psychotherapy research. Chapters on qualitative and mixed methods identify various ways to strengthen the trustworthiness of qualitative findings via rigorous data collection and analysis techniques. Adapted from a special issue of Psychotherapy Research, this volume will be key reading for researchers, academics, and professionals who want a greater understanding of how a particular area of research methods can be used in psychotherapy.

The Psychology Research Companion: From student project to working life not only gives you the skills and confidence to conduct your psychology research project at university, but is the first book to show how these skills will help you get ahead in your first job in the workplace. Jessica S. Horst, an American psychologist teaching in the UK, takes you through every step of the research process; from conceiving your research question and choosing a research methodology, to organizing your time and resources effectively. The book includes sections on ethics, data management, working with research participants and report writing, but each chapter is also informed by the wider aim of providing a toolkit for working life. Each chapter is packed with tips and skills that can be taken into the workplace, including working collaboratively and organising your workload, as well as discussing your research project in interview situations and when applying for jobs. This invaluable guide will appeal to all undergraduate and postgraduate psychology students whose aim is to learn a set of transferable research skills as well as to obtain a good degree result.

This text introduces teachers to research methods they can use to examine their own classrooms in order to become more effective teachers. Becoming familiar with classroom-based research methods not only enables teachers to do research in their own classrooms, it also provides a basis for assessing the findings of existing research. McKay emphasizes throughout that what a teacher chooses to examine will dictate which method is most effective. Each chapter includes activities to help readers apply the methods described in the chapter, often by analyzing research data. *Chapter I, Classroom Research, introduces the reader to major research purposes and research types as they relate to classroom research, the distinction between quantitative and qualitative research, the formulation of research questions and research designs, and ethical issues in research. *Chapter II, Researching Teachers and Learners, presents research methods that can be used to examine teachers' and learners' attitudes and behaviors: action research, survey research, interviews, verbal reports, diary studies, case studies, and ethnographies. *Chapter III, Researching Classroom Discourse, deals with methods that can be used to study the oral and written discourse of classrooms: interaction analysis, discourse analysis, text analysis, and ways to examine the social and political assumptions underlying the choice and presentation of content in second language teaching materials. *Chapter IV, Writing Research Reports, provides guidelines for both thesis writing and journal articles. Researching Second Language Classrooms is an ideal text for TESOL research methods courses and an essential resource for inservice teachers who wish to undertake classroom research.

Since the early days of performance assessment, human ratings have been subject to various forms of error and bias. Expert raters often come up with different ratings for the very same performance and it seems that assessment outcomes largely depend upon which raters happen to assign the rating. This book provides an introduction to many-facet Rasch measurement (MFRM), a psychometric approach that establishes a coherent framework for drawing reliable, valid, and fair inferences from rater-mediated assessments, thus answering the problem of fallible human ratings. Revised and updated throughout, the Second Edition includes a stronger focus on the Facets computer program, emphasizing the pivotal role that MFRM plays for validating the interpretations and uses of assessment outcomes.

In this book, William R. Uttal continues his analysis and critique of theories of mind. This book considers theories that are based on macroneural responses (such as those obtained from fMRI) that represent the averaged or cumulative responses of many neurons. The analysis is carried out with special emphasis on the logical and conceptual difficulties in developing a theory but with special attention to some of the current attempts to go from these cumulative responses to explanations of the grand question of how the mind is generated by the brain. While acknowledging the importance of these macroneural techniques in the study of the anatomy and physiology of the brain, Uttal concludes that this macroneural approach is not likely to produce a valid neural theory of cognition because the critical information-the states of the individual neurons-involved in brain activity becoming mental activity is actually lost in the process of summation. Controversial topics are considered in detail including discussions of empirical, logical, and technological barriers to theory building in cognitive neuroscience.