bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Vegetation turnover in a braided river: frequency and effectiveness of floods of different magnitude
Authors: Surian Nicola , Barban Matteo , Ziliani Luca , Monegato Giovanni , Bertoldi Walter , Comiti Francesco 
Published: September 2014

AbstractThis work addresses the temporal dynamics of riparian vegetation in large braided rivers, exploring the relationship between vegetation erosion and flood magnitude. In particular, it investigates the existence of a threshold discharge, or a range of discharges, above which erosion of vegetated patches within the channel occurs. The research was conducted on a 14 km long reach of the Tagliamento River, a braided river in north‐eastern Italy. Ten sets of aerial photographs were used to investigate vegetation dynamics in the period 1954–2011. By using different geographic information system (GIS) procedures, three aspects of geomorphic‐vegetation dynamics and interactions were addressed: (i) long‐term (1954–2011) channel evolution and vegetation dynamics; (ii) the relationship between vegetation erosion/establishment and flow regime; (iii) vegetation turnover, in the period 1986–2011. Results show that vegetation turnover is remarkably rapid in the study reach with 50% of in‐channel vegetation persisting for less than 5–6 years and only 10% of vegetation persisting for more than 18–19 years. The analysis shows that significant vegetation erosion is determined by relatively frequent floods, i.e. floods with a recurrence interval of c. 1–2.5 years, although some differences exist between sub‐reaches with different densities of vegetation cover. These findings suggest that the erosion of riparian vegetation in braided rivers may not be controlled solely by very large floods, as is the case for lower energy gravel‐bed rivers. Besides flow regime, other factors seem to play a significant role for in‐channel vegetation cover over long time spans. In particular, erosion of marginal vegetation, which supplies large wood elements to the channel, increased notably over the study period and was an important factor for in‐channel vegetation trends. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
STATUS OF RESEARCH ON ITEM CONTENT AND DIFFERENTIAL PERFORMANCE ON TESTS USED IN HIGHER EDUCATION
Authors: Boldt Robert F. 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACT“Outlier studies” identify items for which extreme differences in performance by contrasting groups occur; these extreme items are the “outliers” referred to. Review of the studies conducted on tests receiving major use in higher education reveals that though one cannot make a priori classifications of outliers with confidence, one can with reasonable confidence predict the relatively advantaged group for many verbal items if they subsequently prove to be outliers as follows: aesthetic‐philosophical, human relations or female oriented content relatively favors females as opposed to males; practical affairs, science or male oriented content relatively favors males as opposed to females; science content relatively favors whites as opposed to blacks. For test content that varies in the degree of relatedness to minorities, one would predict a relative advantage for those outliers that are most related to minorities. The magnitude of the differences found is not large; perhaps larger differences would be found if classifications other than race and sex, which are the most common, were used. It has been found that differences in cultural or national origin produce larger discrepancies in item difficulty than differences in race or sex of essentially native American groups.
INTERPERSONAL COMPETENCE, SOCIAL INTELLIGENCE, AND GENERAL ABILITY
Authors: Stricker Lawrence J. 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTThe goal of this study was to appraise the construct validity of a videotape‐based situational test, the Interpersonal Competence Instrument (ICI), specifically its convergent validity with regard to other measures of social intelligence as well as its discriminant validity with respect to indexes of general ability. The ICI was administered to college students (fraternity and sorority members, and dormitory residents) along with a battery of other devices: self‐rating, peer rating, and inventory measures of social intelligence and general ability; objective tests of major components of social intelligence and general ability; and control measures. Five factors emerged in a factor analysis of the measures: general ability, age, sex, halo, and distance to the video receiver. The ICI Judgments–Accuracy score defined the general ability factor and had a borderline loading on the age factor; the ICI Replies–Effectiveness score did not appear on any factor. The Judgments–Accuracy score seems to be tapping general ability to some extent, whereas what the Replies–Effectiveness score is assessing cannot be determined at all.
ATTEMPTS AT DEFINING INTERPERSONAL COMPETENCIES
Authors: Baird Leonard L. 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTThis review was intended to identify generic skills in interpersonal relations and to examine the implications of research for attempts to assess these skills. Using a developmental framework, three areas of research were reviewed: the social development of children and adolescents, clinical studies of interpersonal competence, and studies of effective leadership. Six skills appeared in this literature: use of basic social forms, common interactions with others, constructive assertiveness, internal monitoring, emotional expression, and the coordination of group activities.
IMPLICATIONS OF COGNITIVE THEORY FOR INSTRUCTION IN PROBLEM SOLVING
Authors: Frederiksen Norman 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTCognitive theories of problem solving and suggestions made by cognitive psychologists regarding how to teach problem solving are reviewed. Theories and suggestions from creativity research are also considered. The results are summarized in a description of how high levels of proficiency in problem solving are acquired and how problem solving skills might best be taught, keeping in mind a distinction between well and ill‐structured problems. The need for practice materials is discussed, and some desirable qualities of such materials are suggested. Finally, several unresolved issues regarding instructional methods are considered.
SUMMARIES OF STUDIES INVOLVING THE TEST OF ENGLISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE, 1963–1982
Authors: Hale Gordon A. , Stansfield Charles W. , Duran Richard P. 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTThis set of 82 summaries is based on papers written between 1963 and 1982 concerning TOEFL. The papers summarized consist primarily of reports of research involving TOEFL. Also included are a few descriptive papers, which are summarized here to provide a perspective on the history and development of the test. The methods and criteria by which papers were identified for inclusion, as well as a scheme for classification of the papers, are presented in the Introduction.
STATISTICS IN ANTITRUST LITIGATION
Authors: King Benjamin F. 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTThe antitrust laws were made to discourage business firms from improper use of economic power. They were intended to keep markets competitive, and to ensure that the behavior of businesses toward other firms, as well as toward consumers, is fair. Cases brought under the antitrust laws involve price‐fixing, improper allocation, control of production, resale price maintenance, tying arrangements, and price discrimination, among other specific practices that may have adverse effects on competition in the marketplace. These cases often fall in the category of complex litigation. Because much of the complexity results from issues of measurement, estimation, and inference under uncertainty, attorneys may hire statisticians as consultants or expert witnesses. This paper deals with the role of the statistician as a consultant or expert witness in cases of antitrust litigation.
TEST SCORE CHANGES ON THE GRE GENERAL (APTITUDE) TEST
Authors: Powers Donald E. , Clark Mary Jo , Grandy Jerilee 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTIn terms of the numbers of examinees involved, test repetition is a significant phenomenon in standardized admission testing. Although it is readily acknowledged that those who repeat admissions tests are a self‐selected group of test takers, there are continuing questions about the bases on which examinees decide to retake a test.Through a survey of examinees who had repeated the GRE General (Aptitude) Test, this study documents some of the factors involved in GRE test takers' decisions to repeat the test and examines the relationships of these factors to test score changes. Implications are drawn for advising examinees who contemplate retaking the GRE as well as graduate admissions staff who are confronted with multiple test scores.
TOEFL FROM A COMMUNICATIVE VIEWPOINT ON LANGUAGE PROFICIENCY: A WORKING PAPER
Authors: Duran Richard P. , Canale Michael , Penfield Joyce , Stansfield Charles W. , Liskin‐Gasparro Judith E. 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTThis report examines the content characteristics of the Test of English as Foreign Language (TOEFL) from a communicative viewpoint based on current theory in applied linguistics and language proficiency assessment. After a review of relevant literature, the authors developed and applied a four‐part operational framework for analyzing the communicative characteristics of a language proficiency test. The first component of this framework consists of the grammatical, sociolinguistic, and discourse competencies required by test tasks. The second component consists of eight factors that could influence test performance. The third component consists of judgements of the relevance of the content of test items to academic and social language use. The final component relates the langauge and language tasks appearing in TOEFL items and sections to a criterion‐referenced scale of language proficiency. In this case, the Interagency Language Roundtable scale was used. Finally, the report discusses test design features that might improve the quality of language proficiency tests.
THE IMPACT OF SELF‐STUDY ON GRE TEST PERFORMANCE
Authors: Swinton Spencer S. , Powers Donald E. 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTThe study reported here was intended to “round out” the GRE Board's continuing study of special test preparation for the GRE General Test by providing information that was previously unavailable on the effects of one kind of special test preparation–self‐test‐familiarization for the verbal and quantitative sections of the test and for the revised analytical portion.The impact of receiving, and of being encouraged to study, the newly expanded GRE Information Bulletin and copies of disclosed forms of the GRE General Test was investigated in an experimental design in which randomly selected samples of test takers were encouraged to prepare in various ways for the test.In a previous similar study of the analytical section of the test, self‐study was found to improve performance on two analytical item types that were subsequently removed from the test. In the present study, no practically significant effects were detected for the verbal, quantitative, or revised analytical sections of the test.
RELATIONSHIP OF ADMISSION TEST SCORES TO WRITING PERFORMANCE OF NATIVE AND NONNATIVE SPEAKERS OF ENGLISH
Authors: Carlson Sybil B. , Bridgeman Brent , Camp Roberta , Waanders Janet 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTFour writing samples were obtained from 638 applicants for admission to U.S. institutions as undergraduates or as graduate students in business, engineering, or social science. The applicants represented three major foreign language groups (Arabic, Chinese, and Spanish), plus a small sample of native English speakers. Two of the writing topics were of the compare and contrast type and the other two involved chart and graph interpretation. The writing samples were scored by 23 readers who are English as a second language specialists and 23 readers who are English writing experts. Each of the four writing samples was scored holistically, and during a separate rating session two of the samples from each student were assigned separate scores for sentence‐level and discourse‐level skills. Representative subsamples of the papers also were scored descriptively with the Writer's Workbench computer program and by graduate‐level subject matter professors in engineering and the social sciences.In addition to the writing sample scores, TOEFL scores were obtained for all students in the foreign sample. GRE General Test scores were obtained for students in the U.S. sample and for a subsample of students in the foreign sample. Students in the U.S. sample also took a multiple‐choice measure of writing ability.Among the key findings were the following: 1) holistic scores, discourse‐level scores, and sentence‐level scores were so closely related that the holistic score alone should be sufficient; 2) correlations among topics were as high across topic types as within topic types; 3) scores of ESL raters, English raters, and subject matter raters were all highly correlated, suggesting substantial agreement in the standards used; correlations and factor analyses indicated that scores on the writing samples and TOEFL were highly related, but that each also was reliably measuring some aspect of English language proficiency that was not assessed by the other; and (5) correlations of holistic writing sample scores with scores on item types within the sections of the GRE General Test yielded a pattern of relationships that was consistent with the relationships reported in other GRE studies.
THE TWO‐PREDICTOR VALIDITY CURVE
Authors: Dorans Neil J. , Kulick Edward 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTA visual display known as the two‐predictor validity curve is introduced. Derivations are presented for the general case. Then, for illustrative purposes the two predictors are taken to be SAT‐V (V) and SAT‐M (M), and the criterion of interest is the first year college grade point average (FYA). The two‐predictor validity curve, in this case SAT V&M, allows one to assess the relative importance of SAT‐V in relation to SAT‐M for predicting the criterion of interest. When several V&M curves are placed on a single page, comparisons across gender can be made and trends across time can also be studied. Several illustrations using SAT data are presented.
STUDENT CHANGE, PROGRAM CHANGE: WHY THE SAT SCORES KEPT FALLING
Authors: Turnbull William W. 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTThe first leg of the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) score decline occurred mainly in the 1960s. It seemed to be explained fairly satisfactorily by the evidence that the composition of the test‐taking group had changed to include a larger proportion of students with relatively low‐developed ability, mirroring the increased holding power of education for teenagers. In studies made during the 1970s, no comparable underlying change was found to explain the second (mainly 1970s) segment of the decline, which was ascribed instead to a complex of factors—“pervasive influences”—in both school and society.In this study, the importance of pervasive societal influences on student learning is not in dispute. A variety of data suggests, however, that the increase in school retention rates of poorly prepared students and the resulting heterogeneity of the senior high school population is a unifying explanatory variable for the second leg of the decline as well as the first. The argument is that several of the “pervasive influences” invoked to explain the continuation of the decline in the 1970s are best understood as adaptive responses of the schools to the appearance of a greater diversity of students in senior high school. These responses, which in combination represent a reduction in the demand level of the school program, included grade inflation, proliferation of electives, textbook simplification, and reduction in homework assignments. Students also chose fewer academic and more vocational and general courses. It is hypothesized that the continuation of the decline in the 1970s was, in substantial part, the direct consequence of those school‐related changes and thus was a delayed, indirect consequence of the compositional shift.The two declines seem to have been reciprocal rather than unrelated. Student changes begat program changes, and each new condition in its turn led to lower scores. The paradigm helps to explain why high scores became scarcer in the 1970s, why the scores of students with high class rank continued to drop while those of students with lower class standing stabilized or turned up, and why the pervasive factors seemed to affect only the senior high school students.This report suggests that the academic demand level of the schools probably stopped falling in the late 1970s, that 1980 marked a significant turning point, and that the recent slight upturn in SAT scores marks the beginning of a positive trend rather than a pause before a continuation of the drop.
THE BUDDHA AND THE COMPUTER: CAREER GUIDANCE IN TAIWAN
Authors: Katz Martin R. 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTCareer decision making in Taiwan is examined in the context of a society undergoing dynamic change as modern entrepreneurial values are accommodated in a cherished traditional culture. Recommendations are made on the following topics: rationale for guidance, model of career decision making, individual assessment, development of occupational information, linkages between individual characteristics and occupational attributes, strategy and algorithm for career decision making, testing, and counselor preparation.
EXPLORATION OF CAUSES OF BIAS IN TEST ITEMS
Authors: Scheuneman Janice 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTAlthough the study of item bias has been an active area of research for the past few years, little progress has been made in understanding what factors in a test might create bias. To advance this understanding, a number of hypotheses were developed concerning elements of the items that might affect the performance of Blacks and Whites differently. The elements investigated were characteristics that would be common to several items that otherwise measured different concepts or content.Seven general hypotheses were developed and tested in the form of 16 specific hypotheses, most with five or six items. For purposes of this study, items were developed in pairs, with a hypothesized element present in one item and missing or modified in the other. The item pairs were assembled into two separate sections and administered as part of the Graduate Record Examinations General Test. Pairs of test sections were developed for each of the three areas tested in the General Test: verbal, quantitative, and analytical ability. These sections were spiralled for administration to yield randomly equivalent groups of examinees.The 16 specific hypotheses were evaluated separately using log linear analyses. Results showed that 10 of the 16 hypotheses showed interactions between group membership and item version indicating a differential effect of the manipulation on the performance of Black and White examinees. Eight of these hypotheses were also analyzed for item bias at the individual item level, using a procedure based on item response theory.The conclusion was that item manipulations of the type hypothesized did have a differential effect on the performance of Black and White examinees. The complexity of the effects, however, suggested that other uncontrolled factors affecting performance were also operating. A number of suggestions for future research based on these results were provided.
A SURVEY OF ACADEMIC DEMANDS RELATED TO LISTENING SKILLS
Authors: Powers Donald E. 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTA literature review was conducted in order to identify various parameters underlying listening comprehension. The results of this review were used as a basis for a survey of faculty in six graduate fields as well as undergraduate English faculty. The purpose of the survey was to (a) obtain faculty perceptions of the importance to academic success of various listening skills and activities, (b) assess the degree to which both native and nonnative speakers experience difficulties with these skills or activities, and (c) determine faculty views of alternative means of evaluating these skills.Faculty perceived some listening skills as more important than others for academic success. These included nine skills in particular that were related primarily to various aspects of lecture content (e.g., identifying major ideas and relationships among them). As might be expected, faculty perceived that nonnative students experience more difficulty than native students with all listening activities, and that nonnative students have disproportionately greater difficulty with some activities, such as following lectures given at different speeds and comprehending or deducing the meaning of important vocabulary. With respect to measuring listening comprehension, some general approaches and specific item types were judged to be more appropriate than others. These included tasks that entail answering questions involving the recall of details as well as those involving inference or deductions.The results of the survey are used to suggest further research on the construct validity of the Listening Comprehension section of the TOEFL® test.
THE PSYCHOMETRIC CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GRE GENERAL TEST FOR THREE HANDICAPPED GROUPS
Authors: Bennett Randy Elliot , Rock Donald A. , Jirele Thomas 
Published: September 2014

ABSTRACTThis study examined the psychometric characteristics of the Graduate Record Examinations (GRE) General Test for three handicapped groups. Information about test characteristics is central to judging the accuracy and fairness of General Test scores for handicapped students.Four psychometric characteristics were studied: level of test performance, test completion, test reliability, and unexpected differential item performance. Psychometric comparisons were made between nonhandicapped samples and each of three handicapped groups: visually impaired students taking large‐type, extended‐time administrations; visually impaired students taking timed, regular‐type administrations; and physically handicapped students taking timed, regular‐type administrations.Results of the study showed the performance of the visually handicapped groups to closely approximate that of nondisabled students. Physically handicapped students, however, performed substantially lower than the comparison group on two of the three General Test scales.Data on test completion showed evidence of possible disadvantage to the two groups of disabled examinees taking timed administrations. Evidence that handicapped students were somewhat less likely to complete the test was found for both groups on the Analytical sections and for one group on the first Quantitative section. Though these scores may, as a result, underestimate developed scholastic ability, any conclusion on this account must await the findings of further research.Test reliability was analyzed using both internal consistency and parallel‐forms methods. Neither method revealed any practical differences in measurement precision across groups.Because of the large number and general unreliability of individual item‐performance contrasts, unexpected differential item performance was examined through a two‐stage procedure. The first stage centered on the performance of item clusters. Items composing clusters showing questionable performance were then individually examined. This two‐stage procedure revealed only two instances–localized to visually impaired students taking the large‐type test–of differential item performance.In terms of both reliability and item behavior, the psychometric characteristics of the GRE General Test appear comparable for the handicapped and nondisabled groups studied. Though somewhat less comparable, test completion and performance levels also were similar across groups. Further studies of General Test scores–in particular, their factor structure and predictive validity–should provide additional information about their meaning for handicapped students.