A technique to study combined influence of environmental and genetic factors on the base of changes in phenotype distributions is presented. Histograms are exploited as base analyzed characteristics. A continuous time, discrete state Markov process with piece-wise constant interstate transition rates is associated with evolution of each histogram.…

Although research has established that phonological awareness is a predictor of future reading skill, the effects of variant vs. contiguous presentations of grapheme-phoneme correspondences as part of a teaching program have not been examined. A variant presentation is one in which there is a mismatch between the letter and sound or sound and…

A survey of 96 Australian primary and secondary school teachers was carried out based on a stratified random sample. The study aimed to determine Middle Years teachers' perceptions and management of disruptive classroom behaviour. Variables such as gender, teacher confidence and experience, supports, specific disruptive student behaviours, and…

The purpose of this study was to describe the extent to which undergraduates engage in disciplined enquiry, as one means of operationalising critical thinking. Three hundred essays from second-year students were judged on the indicators of disciplinary concepts, elaborated written communication and analysis. Non parametric statistical tests…

This paper examines reading achievement when the maternal/paternal language has become a de facto second language. The performance of a cohort of Greek-Australian high school students (N = 270) on a diagnostic Greek reading test was significantly below that of pupils in second to fourth grades in Greece. The mean item difficulty for…

This study examines the use of a cooperative physical games program "The Game Factory" on social behaviour among children. Children are required to work together towards positive collective outcomes. A pretest-intervention-posttest design is used. Parents and teachers assessed 90 Australian primary school children in two experimental groups and…

This paper describes the validation of actual and preferred forms of a new classroom environment instrument--the Technology-Rich Outcomes-Focused Learning Environment Inventory (TROFLEI)--using multitrait-multimethod modelling. The 80-item TROFLEI assesses 10 classroom environment dimensions: Student Cohesiveness, Teacher Support, Involvement,…

This paper outlines the procedures used in the textual analysis of examiner reports for 101 PhD candidates across disciplines in one Australian University. The method involves the use of QSR software. Three levels of findings are outlined. The first level is the coding categories that emerged out of reading the report text. There are five broad…

This paper discusses ways in which examiners position themselves in relation to doctoral students' knowledge. The epistemological thesis of Habermas is utilized and its well-established connections with the world of formal learning re-stated. Against this conceptual framework, the examiner reports are appraised with a view to identifying the ways…

This paper focuses on doctoral assessment as an area that has been relatively neglected in higher education research. It then describes and justifies a mixed-method approach to the study of PhD examination processes and outcomes in Australia. The design is reported of a study including candidate and candidature information for approximately 800…

This longitudinal study investigated sex and age differences and the short- and long-term effects of low-income mothers' talk to their children. Twenty-four girls and twenty-four boys were audiotaped playing with magnets with their mothers at the ages of 5 and 9 years. When children were in sixth grade, they completed a test of reading…

This study examined longitudinal associations between child temperament (fearfulness, irritability, positive emotionality, self-regulation) and parenting (acceptance, involvement, inconsistent discipline) in predicting children's internalizing and externalizing problems using a community sample (N = 92) of children (ages 8-11) and their mothers.…

The association of mothers' report of family management practices (e.g., family routine and parental achievement expectations) with school achievement, school engagement, and problem behavior was assessed among African American mothers and adolescents. Findings revealed that family routine was positively associated with school achievement and…

Sociometric status classifications of 205 youths (average age 11.3 years) were assessed on three occasions with 1-year intervals, using the current nomination methods and a two-dimensional rating-based procedure (SSrat). The goal of the study was to compare the stability of the methods involved. Preliminarily, it is shown that (a) the data allowed…

This exploratory study used structured tasks as direct measures of approaches to learning to examine a potentially important domain of school readiness that is comprised of the multiple ways children engage in learning situations. A structured task designed to measure problem-solving flexibility was found to relate to a subset of a teacher rating…