Bob Williams

Faculty Forum

Bob Williams et al. — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 08:00:48 PDT

Psychological Critical Thinking As a Course Predictor and Outcome Variable

Bob Williams et al. — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 07:41:34 PDT

Students' scores on a psychological critical thinking instrument administered at the beginning and end of a large human development course significantly correlated with multiple-choice exam scores, with the posttest critical thinking scores being the better predictor of exam performance. The sample as a whole gained significantly on critical thinking, but students with high and low exam scores differed in their patterns of change on critical thinking. Students who scored high (As and B+s) on the exams significantly improved their critical thinking scores, whereas students who scored low (Ds and Fs) on the exams did not. An explicit practice and feedback procedure implemented through an existing course activity presumably contributed to gains in critical thinking.

Faculty Forum

Bob Williams et al. — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 07:31:25 PDT

College Students' Ratings of Student Effort, Student Ability and Teacher Input as Correlates of Student Performance on Multiple-choice Exams

Bob Williams et al. — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 07:21:24 PDT

In the class session following feedback regarding their scores on multiple-choice exams, undergraduate students in a large human development course rated the strength of possible contributors to their exam performance. Students rated items related to their personal effort in preparing for the exam (identified as student effort in the paper), their ability to perform well on the exams (identified as student ability), and teacher input that might have affected their exam performance. Students rated most student effort items higher than teacher input and student ability items. Notwithstanding, across all exams, ratings of student ability and teacher input correlated more strongly with exam performance than did student effort ratings. High and low performers on the exams differed significantly on ratings of student ability and teacher input, but were more similar on ratings of student effort.

Militarism and Sociopolitical Perspectives Among College Students in the U.S. and South Korea

Bob Williams et al. — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 07:13:48 PDT

Students in a U.S. university (n = 187) and a South Korean university (n = 201) responded to a sociopolitical questionnaire that included measures of militarism, nationalism, internationalism, patriotism, respect for civil liberties, and tolerance of dissent. Most correlations between militarism and the comparison sociopolitical variables proved significant in both samples but tended to be stronger in the U.S. sample. Militarism correlated positively with nationalism and patriotism but negatively with internationalism, respect for civil liberties, and tolerance of dissent. The strongest relationships were between militarism and both respect for civil liberties and tolerance of dissent. In the U.S. sample, relationships between militarism and the sociopolitical variables were stronger for males than females.

Sociopolitical and Personality Correlates of Militarism in Democratic Societies

Bob Williams et al. — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 07:41:04 PDT

This article synthesizes research on the sociopolitical and personality constructs that most frequently correlated with militarism in the published social science research literature between 1931 and 2007. The reviewed research includes diverse definitions and assessment measures for each highlighted construct featured in studies conducted with various types of participants in several different democratic societies. The principal sociopolitical correlates of militarism included conservatism, nationalism, religiosity, patriotism-blind patriotism, and internationalism-worldmindedness. The major personality correlates of militarism were authoritarianism, dominance-power, ethnocentrism, masculinity, and punitiveness. All of these variables, except internationalism-worldmindedness, positively correlated with militarism. Meta-analysis reveals that the correlations between militarism and each set of comparison variables typically yielded an average effect size in the small to medium range.

Lifestyle correlates of Carpal Tunnel Syndrome

Bob Williams et al. — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 07:23:23 PDT

The potential for predicting membership in a Carpal Tunnel Syndrome group (CTS) vs. a non-CTS group was evaluated for five psychological variables (i.e., life events stress, perceived stress, self-management habits, cognitive self-control skills, and lifestyle organization) and three physical variables (i.e., general physical symptoms, suspected medical risk for CTS, and generic musculoskeletal problems). The subjects included 50 pairs of workers, with each pair having one worker who had CTS and the other who had not. A logistic regression analysis indicated that five of the measures (three psychological and two physical) were significant single model predictors of membership in CTS and non-CTS groups. The most efficient multifactor model in predicting CTS appeared to be a combination of measures reflecting generic musculoskeletal problems and lifestyle organization.

Introduction to Health and Safety Issue

Bob Williams — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 07:03:37 PDT

Operational Definitions and Assessment of Higher-Order Cognitive Constructs

Bob Williams — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 06:53:40 PDT

The educational psychology literature is replete with references to higher-order cognitive constructs, such as critical thinking and creativity. Presumably, these constructs represent the primary processes and outcomes that educators should promote in students. For these constructs to be maximally useful, they must be transformed into specific operational definitions that lead to reliable and valid assessment strategies. Minimizing overlap in the definitions and assessment of different concepts would contribute to an orderly accumulation of knowledge about the constructs in question. The ideal would be for each construct to have a definition that is distinct from the definitions of other cognitive constructs. Although higher-order cognitive constructs have much surface appeal, their utility is tied to the clarity and fidelity of their definitions and assessment procedures.

Undergraduates' Evaluations of Developmental Claims and Their Identification of Information Sources

Bob Williams et al. — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 06:42:00 PDT

Students in a large human development course rated the accuracy of 50 developmental claims. Half of the claims were specifically embedded in the course content, but the remaining claims were not addressed in the course. Students also identified the major information source for each developmental claim rated. From the beginning to the end of the course, students (especially high performers) improved in evaluating the accuracy of course-related developmental claims and increasingly attributed their ratings of these claims to professional information sources. Our study underscores the importance of sensitizing students to the role of research evidence in judging the credibility of claims in general education courses.

Academic Freedom in Higher Education Within a Conservative Sociopolitical Culture

Bob Williams — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 06:23:19 PDT

This paper examines the potential threat that a conservative sociopolitical culture poses to academic freedom in state colleges and universities. Already a number of states are considering legislation that would restrict professors’ rights to discuss political issues within their classes, especially political issues having religious or moral implications. The proposed legislation would permit professors to discuss political issues substantively linked to the official subject matter of courses, but would limit professors’ role in such discussion to one of political neutrality. The paper addresses the possibility of discussing controversial sociopolitical issues in college and university classes without alienating an institution’s external support base.

Cooperative Learning Groups at the College Level: Differential Effects on High, Average, and Low Exam Performers

Bob Williams et al. — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 06:18:32 PDT

A repeated-measures mixed-design was used in examining the effects of cooperative learning study teams on exam performance for 378 undergraduate students enrolled in one of 10 large sections of an introductory educational psychology course over a two-semester period. Students were assigned to 5-member cooperative groups based on previous exam achievement (low, average, high). Bonuses (20% of exam score) were offered to groups who improved their mean exam performance to a pre-established criterion in the cooperative-group phase. Results yielded an overall effect size of 0.42 for cooperative study versus individual study. Students who had obtained low and average scores on the preceding exam improved significantly during cooperative study, but the previously high achievers decreased somewhat.

Direct and Indirect Effects of Completion Versus Accuracy Contingencies on Practice-Exam and Actual-Exam Performance

Bob Williams et al. — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 06:09:48 PDT

Students in four sections of an undergraduate educational course (two large and two small sections) took out-of-class practice exams prior to actual exams for each of five course units. Each course unit consisted of five class sessions focusing on a specific developmental theme. Some sections received practice-exam credit based on the number of items completed, whereas other sections received practice-exam credit based on the number of items answered accurately. The contingencies were applied only to the practice exams. A two-way MANOVA included two independent variables (practice-exam contingency and group size) and two dependent variables (practice-exam performance and unit-exam performance). The analysis revealed a main effect for both independent variables across both dependent variables, with students performing better under the accuracy than the completion contingency and better in the small than the large groups. One exception to this overall pattern was a non-significant difference between the large and small groups on the practice exams across both contingencies.

Individual Accountability in Cooperative Learning Groups at the College Level: Differential Effects on High, Average, and Low Exam Performers

Bob Williams et al. — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 05:58:13 PDT

Over a three-semester period in a large undergraduate human development course, students were assigned to 5–7 member groups to work together in preparing for an exam in one of the five content units in the course. Their exam performance was tracked over three units: a baseline unit in which students worked only individually, a unit in which they worked in cooperative teams, and a follow-up unit in which the formal cooperative team structure was removed. Three different bonus-credit contingencies were used in the cooperative learning unit across the three semesters: (a) awarding full bonus credit to each individual in the group if the group as a whole improved its exam performance by the specified amount, (b) awarding partial bonus credit to each individual in the group if the group as a whole improved it exam performance by the specified amount and full bonus credit to each individual who also improved by the specified amount, and (c) awarding full bonus credit to an individual in the group if both the group and the individual improved exam performance by the specified amount. The three contingencies produced somewhat similar patterns of change for low and average performers, but the high performers fared better under the last two contingencies than under the group-only contingency.

Cooperative Learning Contingencies: Unrelated versus Related Individual and Group Contingencies

Bob Williams et al. — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 05:50:06 PDT

College students operating under related cooperative contingencies (students had to earn individual credit before being considered for group credit) showed more consistent individual and group improvement on exam performance than students operating under unrelated contingencies (individual credit and group credit were independently determined). A balanced ratio between individual and group credit proved to be the most productive ratio under the related contingency, whereas a ratio favoring group credit over individual credit proved most productive under the unrelated contingency. In general, a ratio favoring individual credit over group credit was the least productive in promoting both individual and group improvement under both unrelated and related contingencies. The findings showed less difference in improvement of exam scores for students of different performance levels than had been evident in previous research.

Differential Daily Writing Contingencies and Performance on Major Multiple-Choice Exams

Bob Williams et al. — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 05:44:11 PDT

On 4 of 7 days in each unit of an undergraduate human development course, students responded in writing to specific questions related to instructor notes previously made available to them. The study compared the effects of three writing contingencies on the quality of student writing and performance on major multiple-choice exams in the course. The three contingencies were (1) receiving credit for all writing products each unit, (2) receiving credit for one randomly selected writing product each unit, and (3) receiving no credit for any writing product each unit. On all dimensions of exam performance, writing for daily credit produced higher scores than did writing for random credit and writing for no credit. The daily-writing contingency also produced the highest writing ratings across all units; the writing for random credit produced the next highest writing scores; and the writing for no credit yielded the lowest writing scores. Across all three contingencies, writing scores were highly correlated with performance on multiple-choice exams.

Increasing Low-Responding Students’ Participation in Class Discussion

Bob Williams et al. — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 08:25:02 PDT

Students in six sections of a large undergraduate class were asked to record their class comments on notecards in all course units. Additionally, in some units, they received points toward their course grade based on their reported comments in class discussion. The study was conducted over a two-semester period, with slight variation in both the recording and crediting procedures across the two semesters. The primary goal of the study was to determine the effects of two credit and self-recording arrangements on initially low-responding students’ subsequent participation in class discussion (first semester n = 49, second semester n = 45). A higher percentage of low-responding students reported participating in class discussion when credit was given for participation than when no credit was awarded. Nonetheless, 39% of the initially low-responding students the first semester and 38% of the initially low-responding students the second semester did not participate in class discussion in any phase of the study.