The effect of subject age, sex, examiner, and stimulus word differences on developmental sequences of idiodynamic set responses in children's word associations was investigated. Subjects were 100 children, ages 7-11. The findings could not be interpreted as evidence of stage progressions, or hierarchical rankings in mediational processes. (NH)

This study provides support for the hypothesized effect of leniency on the discriminant validity of grouped questionnaire items. It was found that controlling for leniency resulted in a slight decrement in convergent validity but that discriminant validity was substantially improved. Implications for questionnaire validity and further research are…

Item-response changing as a function of test anxiety was investigated. Data supported the hypothesis that high test-anxious students make more item-response changes than low test-anxious students. Also, both high- and low-anxious students profit to a similar extent proportionally from answer changing. (Author/GK)

Studied potential checking and response bias on the Depression Adjective Check Lists (DACL) by comparing scores of college students on true-false, forced-choice, and standard formats. By demonstrating only a weak social desirability response bias and failing to reveal checking bias, results support using the standard format. (Author)

The authors developed a method to identify students in a large-scale assessment program who have not taken the assessment seriously. Instead of responding according to their ability, students may respond using some pattern (e.g., ABCDABCDABCD) to a series of items. This method is compared with model-based methods of identifying such response…

The internal consistency of a scale and various indices of rating scale response styles (such as halo, leniency, and positive or negative response bias) are related to mean scale item intercorrelation. The consequent relationship between internal consistency and rating scale response styles is discussed. (Author/SLD)

Developed a scale for detecting random responses on the Multidimensional Pain Inventory using 95 undergraduates, 34 chronic pain patients, and 115 health-care professionals. A variable response scale was developed that discriminated accurately between valid and random profiles in two cross-validation samples, predicting random profiles with 90%…

Tests Kaufman's hypothesis that WISC-III Freedom from Distractibility and Processing Speed scores will be lower than those from corresponding factors (i.e., Verbal Comprehension) when children display inappropriate test-taking behaviors. This hypothesis was not supported. Encourages clinicians to rely on behavioral indices other than WISC-III…

Whereas great advances have been made in the statistical sophistication of assessments in terms of evidence accumulation and task selection, relatively little statistical work has explored the possibility of applying statistical techniques to data for the purposes of determining appropriate domain understanding and to generate task-level scoring…

To establish the validity of the Personal Orientation Inventory, it was administered to three groups of Ss who represented different levels of sophistication in psychology and self-actualization knowledge. (Author)

Two testing packets, Formative Exercises T-TE-15A and T-TE-15B are reviewed. The Exercises are based on Bloom's concept of learning for mastery and are designed to acquaint teachers with the principles of mastery learning and provide examples of formative evaluation. One form of the exercises provides instant feedback to the examinee; the other,…

Thirty-six undergraduate psychology students who had high measured test anxiety were randomly assigned to one of three groups: covert reinforcement, placebo control, and no-treatment control. Pretreatment, posttreatment, and follow-up scores were obtained on three criterion measures. The findings supported the use of covert reinforcement for…

This study of juries' attitudes toward unattractive defendants is a part of a symposium on legislative and judicial communication. (CH)