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open access

Determination of the Optimal Number of Strata for Bias Reduction in Propensity Score Matching.

Description: Previous research implementing stratification on the propensity score has generally relied on using five strata, based on prior theoretical groundwork and minimal empirical evidence as to the suitability of quintiles to adequately reduce bias in all cases and across all sample sizes. This study investigates bias reduction across varying number of strata and sample sizes via a large-scale simulation to determine the adequacy of quintiles for bias reduction under all conditions. Sample sizes rang… more
Date: May 2010
Creator: Akers, Allen
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

Comparisons of Improvement-Over-Chance Effect Sizes for Two Groups Under Variance Heterogeneity and Prior Probabilities

Description: The distributional properties of improvement-over-chance, I, effect sizes derived from linear and quadratic predictive discriminant analysis (PDA) and from logistic regression analysis (LRA) for the two-group univariate classification were examined. Data were generated under varying levels of four data conditions: population separation, variance pattern, sample size, and prior probabilities. None of the indices provided acceptable estimates of effect for all the conditions examined. There were … more
Date: May 2003
Creator: Alexander, Erika D.
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

An Application of Ridge Regression to Educational Research

Description: Behavioral data are frequently plagued with highly intercorrelated variables. Collinearity is an indication of insufficient information in the model or in the data. It, therefore, contributes to the unreliability of the estimated coefficients. One result of collinearity is that regression weights derived in one sample may lead to poor prediction in another model. One technique which was developed to deal with highly intercorrelated independent variables is ridge regression. It was first propose… more
Date: December 1980
Creator: Amos, Nancy Notley
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

An Empirical Comparison of Random Number Generators: Period, Structure, Correlation, Density, and Efficiency

Description: Random number generators (RNGs) are widely used in conducting Monte Carlo simulation studies, which are important in the field of statistics for comparing power, mean differences, or distribution shapes between statistical approaches. Statistical results, however, may differ when different random number generators are used. Often older methods have been blindly used with no understanding of their limitations. Many random functions supplied with computers today have been found to be comparativel… more
Date: August 1995
Creator: Bang, Jung Woong
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

Establishing the utility of a classroom effectiveness index as a teacher accountability system.

Description: How to identify effective teachers who improve student achievement despite diverse student populations and school contexts is an ongoing discussion in public education. The need to show communities and parents how well teachers and schools improve student learning has led districts and states to seek a fair, equitable and valid measure of student growth using student achievement. This study investigated a two stage hierarchical model for estimating teacher effect on student achievement. This me… more
Date: May 2002
Creator: Bembry, Karen L.
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

Spatial Ability, Motivation, and Attitude of Students as Related to Science Achievement

Description: Understanding student achievement in science is important as there is an increasing reliance of the U.S. economy on math, science, and technology-related fields despite the declining number of youth seeking college degrees and careers in math and science. A series of structural equation models were tested using the scores from a statewide science exam for 276 students from a suburban north Texas public school district at the end of their 5th grade year and the latent variables of spatial abilit… more
Date: May 2011
Creator: Bolen, Judy Ann
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

The Effectiveness of a Mediating Structure for Writing Analysis Level Test Items From Text Based Instruction

Description: This study is concerned with the effect of placing text into a mediated structure form upon the generation of test items for analysis level domain referenced test construction. The item writing methodology used is the linguistic (operationally defined) item writing technology developed by Bormuth, Finn, Roid, Haladyna and others. This item writing methodology is compared to 1) the intuitive method based on Bloom's definition of analysis level test questions and 2) the intuitive with keywords id… more
Date: August 1989
Creator: Brasel, Michael D. (Michael David)
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

A Comparison of Traditional Norming and Rasch Quick Norming Methods

Description: The simplicity and ease of use of the Rasch procedure is a decided advantage. The test user needs only two numbers: the frequency of persons who answered each item correctly and the Rasch-calibrated item difficulty, usually a part of an existing item bank. Norms can be computed quickly for any specific group of interest. In addition, once the selected items from the calibrated bank are normed, any test, built from the item bank, is automatically norm-referenced. Thus, it was concluded that the … more
Date: August 1993
Creator: Bush, Joan Spooner
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

Short-to-Medium Term Enrollment Projection Based on Cycle Regression Analysis

Description: Short-to-medium projections were made of student semester credit hour enrollments for North Texas State University and the Texas Public and Senior Colleges and Universities (as defined by the Coordinating Board, Texas College and University System). Undergraduate, Graduate, Doctorate, Total, Education, Liberal Arts, and Business enrollments were projected. Fall + Spring, Fall, Summer I + Summer II, Summer I were time periods for which projections were made. A new regression analysis called "cyc… more
Date: August 1983
Creator: Chizari, Mohammad
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

Effect of Rater Training and Scale Type on Leniency and Halo Error in Student Ratings of Faculty

Description: The purpose of this study was to determine if leniency and halo error in student ratings could be reduced by training the student raters and by using a Behaviorally Anchored Rating Scale (BARS) rather than a Likert scale. Two hypotheses were proposed. First, the ratings collected from the trained raters would contain less halo and leniency error than those collected from the untrained raters. Second, within the group of trained raters the BARS would contain less halo and leniency error than the… more
Date: May 1987
Creator: Cook, Stuart S. (Stuart Sheldon)
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

A Comparison of Two Criterion-Referenced Item-Selection Techniques Utilizing Simulated Data with Item Pools that Vary in Degrees of Item Difficulty

Description: The problem of this study was to examine the equivalency of two different types of criterion-referenced item-selection techniques on simulated data as item pools varied in degrees of item difficulty. A pretest-posttest design was employed in which pass-fail scores were randomly generated for item pools of twenty-five items. From the item pools, the two techniques determined which items were to be used to make up twelve-item criterion-referenced tests. The twenty-five items also were rank ordere… more
Date: May 1974
Creator: Davis, Robbie G.
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

The Characteristics and Properties of the Threshold and Squared-Error Criterion-Referenced Agreement Indices

Description: Educators who use criterion-referenced measurement to ascertain the current level of performance of an examinee in order that the examinee may be classified as either a master or a nonmaster need to know the accuracy and consistency of their decisions regarding assignment of mastery states. This study examined the sampling distribution characteristics of two reliability indices that use the squared-error agreement function: Livingston's k^2(X,Tx) and Brennan and Kane's M(C). The sampling distri… more
Date: May 1988
Creator: Dutschke, Cynthia F. (Cynthia Fleming)
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

Cross Categorical Scoring: An Approach to Treating Sociometric Data

Description: The purpose of this study was to use a cross categorical scoring method for sociometric data focusing upon those individuals who have made the selections. A cross category selection was defined as choosing an individual on a sociometric instrument who was not within one's own classification. The classifications used for this study were sex, race, and perceived achievement level. A cross category score was obtained by summing the number of cross category selections. The conclusions below are the… more
Date: December 1977
Creator: Ernst, Nora Wilford
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

A Comparison of Three Correlational Procedures for Factor-Analyzing Dichotomously-Scored Item Response Data

Description: In this study, an improved correlational procedure for factor-analyzing dichotomously-scored item response data is described and tested. The procedure involves (a) replacing the dichotomous input values with continuous probability values obtained through Rasch analysis; (b) calculating interitem product-moment correlations among the probabilities; and (c) subjecting the correlations to unweighted least-squares factor analysis. Two simulated data sets and an empirical data set (Kentucky Comprehe… more
Date: May 1991
Creator: Fluke, Ricky
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

The Robustness of O'Brien's r Transformation to Non-Normality

Description: A Monte Carlo simulation technique was employed in this study to determine if the r transformation, a test of homogeneity of variance, affords adequate protection against Type I error over a range of equal sample sizes and number of groups when samples are obtained from normal and non-normal distributions. Additionally, this study sought to determine if the r transformation is more robust than Bartlett's chi-square to deviations from normality. Four populations were generated representing norma… more
Date: August 1985
Creator: Gordon, Carol J. (Carol Jean)
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

A Comparison of Three Criteria Employed in the Selection of Regression Models Using Simulated and Real Data

Description: Researchers who make predictions from educational data are interested in choosing the best regression model possible. Many criteria have been devised for choosing a full or restricted model, and also for selecting the best subset from an all-possible-subsets regression. The relative practical usefulness of three of the criteria used in selecting a regression model was compared in this study: (a) Mallows' C_p, (b) Amemiya's prediction criterion, and (c) Hagerty and Srinivasan's method involving … more
Date: December 1994
Creator: Graham, D. Scott
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

Boundary Conditions of Several Variables Relative to the Robustness of Analysis of Variance Under Violation of the Assumption of Homogeneity of Variances

Description: The purpose of this study is to determine boundary conditions associated with the number of treatment groups (K), the common treatment group sample size (n), and an index of the extent to which the assumption of equality of treatment population variances is violated (Q) with regard to user confidence in application of the one-way analysis of variance F-test for determining equality of treatment population means. The study concludes that the analysis of variance F-test is robust when the number … more
Date: December 1977
Creator: Grizzle, Grady M.
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

Influence of Item Response Theory and Type of Judge on a Standard Set Using the Iterative Angoff Standard Setting Method

Description: The purpose of this investigation was to determine the influence of item response theory and different types of judges on a standard. The iterative Angoff standard setting method was employed by all judges to determine a cut-off score for a public school district-wide criterion-reformed test. The analysis of variance of the effect of judge type and standard setting method on the central tendency of the standard revealed the existence of an ordinal interaction between judge type and method. With… more
Date: August 1992
Creator: Hamberlin, Melanie Kidd
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

A State-Wide Survey on the Utilization of Instructional Technology by Public School Districts in Texas

Description: Effective utilization of instructional technology can provide a valuable method for the delivery of a school program, and enable a teacher to individualize according to student needs. Implementation of such a program is costly and requires careful planning and adequate staff development for school personnel. This study examined the degree of commitment by Texas school districts to the use of the latest technologies in their efforts to revolutionize education. Quantitative data were collected by… more
Date: May 1990
Creator: Hiett, Elmer D. (Elmer Donald)
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

Parent Involvement and Science Achievement: A Latent Growth Curve Analysis

Description: This study examined science achievement growth across elementary and middle school and parent school involvement using the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study – Kindergarten Class of 1998 – 1999 (ECLS-K). The ECLS-K is a nationally representative kindergarten cohort of students from public and private schools who attended full-day or half-day kindergarten class in 1998 – 1999. The present study’s sample (N = 8,070) was based on students that had a sampling weight available from the public-use da… more
Date: August 2011
Creator: Johnson, Ursula Yvette
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

Stratified item selection and exposure control in unidimensional adaptive testing in the presence of two-dimensional data.

Description: It is not uncommon to use unidimensional item response theory (IRT) models to estimate ability in multidimensional data. Therefore it is important to understand the implications of summarizing multiple dimensions of ability into a single parameter estimate, especially if effects are confounded when applied to computerized adaptive testing (CAT). Previous studies have investigated the effects of different IRT models and ability estimators by manipulating the relationships between item and person… more
Date: August 2009
Creator: Kalinowski, Kevin E.
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

A comparison of traditional and IRT factor analysis.

Description: This study investigated the item parameter recovery of two methods of factor analysis. The methods researched were a traditional factor analysis of tetrachoric correlation coefficients and an IRT approach to factor analysis which utilizes marginal maximum likelihood estimation using an EM algorithm (MMLE-EM). Dichotomous item response data was generated under the 2-parameter normal ogive model (2PNOM) using PARDSIM software. Examinee abilities were sampled from both the standard normal and unif… more
Date: December 2004
Creator: Kay, Cheryl Ann
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

The Generalization of the Logistic Discriminant Function Analysis and Mantel Score Test Procedures to Detection of Differential Testlet Functioning

Description: Two procedures for detection of differential item functioning (DIF) for polytomous items were generalized to detection of differential testlet functioning (DTLF). The methods compared were the logistic discriminant function analysis procedure for uniform and non-uniform DTLF (LDFA-U and LDFA-N), and the Mantel score test procedure. Further analysis included comparison of results of DTLF analysis using the Mantel procedure with DIF analysis of individual testlet items using the Mantel-Haenszel (… more
Date: August 1994
Creator: Kinard, Mary E.
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
open access

A Comparison of IRT and Rasch Procedures in a Mixed-Item Format Test

Description: This study investigated the effects of test length (10, 20 and 30 items), scoring schema (proportion of dichotomous ad polytomous scoring) and item analysis model (IRT and Rasch) on the ability estimates, test information levels and optimization criteria of mixed item format tests. Polytomous item responses to 30 items for 1000 examinees were simulated using the generalized partial-credit model and SAS software. Portions of the data were re-coded dichotomously over 11 structured proportions to … more
Date: August 2003
Creator: Kinsey, Tari L.
Item Type: Refine your search to only Thesis or Dissertation
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