Undergraduate business students completed two multiple-choice tests: one in which they indicated their answer and one of three levels of confidence, and one in which they circled the item only when they possessed high confidence in the answer. The three-level test took longer to take and grade; students preferred the second format. Both types…

Compared a standard multiple choice exam format with two modified formats which provide instructors with information on students' risk preferences (students answer questions twice) and confidence in their answers (students assign a point value to questions). Found that while the alternatives offer increased choice to students and low-cost…

Vocational education researchers have relied heavily on opinionnaires to measure opinions and attitudes. Usually respondents are asked to indicate their degree of agreement to an attitude or opinion statement. Where significant statistical differences exist for opinions/attitudes there is still always the problem of confidence with which…

How often are people wrong when they are certain that they know the answer to a question? The studies reported here suggest that the answer is "too often". The psychological bases for unwarranted certainty are discussed in terms of the inferential processes whereby knowledge is constructed from perceptions and memories. (Editor/RK)

Identifies three sources of reporting deficiency for meta-analytic results: quality (adequacy) of publicizing; quality of macrolevel reporting, and quality of microlevel reporting. Reanalysis of 25 reports from the Smith, Glass and Miller (1980) psychotherapy meta-analysis established two sources of misinformation, interrater reliabilities and…

It was concluded that although significant correlations between personality variables and confidence testing scores could be obtained, these correlations did not hold up with replication. (Authors)

Administered Rokeach Value Survey (RVS) and confidence rating scale (CRS) to 13 psychotherapists and 62 clients. Results from RVS demonstrated therapists were more value stable than their clients and that clients shifted their value systems toward therapists' value configurations. Results from CRS indicated therapists were more confident than were…

Many purported demonstrations of irrational behavior rely on the assumption that participants believe key task parameters that are merely asserted by experimenters. For example, previous researchers have found that participants who first reported confidence in items presented in a yes-no format did not change confidence to the degree prescribed by…

Confidence intervals (CIs) for means are frequently advocated as alternatives to null hypothesis significance testing (NHST), for which a common theme in the debate is that conclusions from CIs and NHST should be mutually consistent. The authors examined a class of CIs for which the conclusions are said to be inconsistent with NHST in…

The purposes of the study were to develop a measure of overconfidence on probabilistic tests, to assess the measurement characteristics of such a measure, and to investigate the relationship of overconfidence on tests to knowledge and to risk-taking propensity. (Author/BB)

The present study was directed at determining the extent to which the Type I Error rate is affected by violations in the basic assumptions of the q statistic. Monte Carlo methods were employed, and a variety of departures from the assumptions were examined. (Author)

Describes confidence testing methods (confidence weighting, probabilistic marking, multiple alternative selection) as alternative to computer-based, multiple choice tests and explains potential benefits (increased reliability, improved examinee evaluation of alternatives, extended diagnostic information and remediation prescriptions, happier…

Examines five to seven year olds' assumptions about the experiential connotation of "I know that's X." Two experiments compare two groups of children (five and six year olds, six and seven year olds) who were asked to choose between items and asked whether they were sure or whether they knew they had made the right choice. (21 references) (GLR)

Butterfield found that internal Ss tended to make more constructive responses to frustration-type situations than did extrenal Ss. Therefore, this study predicted that internal Ss would rate themselves as more confident with regard to problem-solving abilities than would external Ss. (Author)

Confidence scored tests allow subjects to respond to the options on a multiple choice test by assigning probabilities to each of the item options. This paper describes an interactive FORTRAN computer program used for administering, scoring, and interpreting the results of confidence scored tests. (Author/JKS)