Search Results

Selection Bias and Sensitivity as Moderators of Prekindergarten Age-Cutoff Regression Discontinuity Study Effects: A Meta-Analysis

Description: The age-cutoff regression discontinuity design (RDD) has emerged as one of the most rigorous quasi-experimental approaches to determining program effects of prekindergarten on literacy and numeracy outcomes for children at kindergarten entry. However, few pre-K meta-analyses have focused attention on validity threats. The current random-effects meta-regression tests the moderating effects of prominent threats to validity, selection bias and sensitivity, on impact estimates generated from age-cu… more
This item is restricted from view until August 1, 2024.
Date: July 2023
Creator: Stewart, Genea K.
Partner: UNT Libraries

Lasso Regularization for DIF Detection in Graded Response Models

Description: Previous research has tested the lasso method for DIF detection in dichotomous items, but limited research is available on this technique for polytomous items. This simulation study compares the lasso method to hybrid ordinal logistic regression to test performance in terms of TP and FP rates when considering sample size, test length, number of response categories, group balance, DIF proportion, and DIF magnitude. Results showed better Type I error control with the lasso, with smaller sample si… more
This item is restricted from view until June 1, 2025.
Date: May 2023
Creator: Avila Alejo, Denisse
Partner: UNT Libraries

Parenting Highly and Profoundly Gifted Children: Perspectives on Competence, Belonging, and Support within a Sociocultural Context

Description: Limited research exists regarding the experiences and perspectives of parents of highly and profoundly gifted children. The purpose of this qualitative study was to investigate the experiences and perspectives of parents of highly and profoundly gifted children in developmental and cultural contexts. Semi-structured interviews were followed by thematic analysis regarding parental efficacy and parents' perceived support in parenting and educational communities to provide rich insights and to ill… more
Date: May 2023
Creator: Johnson, Rebecca M.
Partner: UNT Libraries

Implementing the Difference in Differences (Dd) Estimator in Observational Education Studies: Evaluating the Effects of Small, Guided Reading Instruction for English Language Learners

Description: The present study provides an example of implementing the difference in differences (DD) estimator for a two-group, pretest-posttest design with K-12 educational intervention data. The goal is to explore the basis for causal inference via Rubin's potential outcomes framework. The DD method is introduced to educational researchers, as it is seldom implemented in educational research. DD analytic methods' mathematical formulae and assumptions are explored to understand the opportunity and the cha… more
Date: July 2023
Creator: Sebastian, Princy
Partner: UNT Libraries

Sleeping in a Creative Dream-Land: A Duo of Meta-Analyses on Sleep, Dream-Recall, and Creativity

Description: This duo of meta-analyses explored relationships between creativity and sleep quality [Study 1], and creativity and dream recall [Study 2]. Studies on these topics noted personality influences in both creativity and sleep quality, as well as dream recall. Studies also identified potential connections between creativity, sleep, and dreaming by investigating the stage of sleep from which creative thinking could emerge. Twenty studies were eligible to code and analyze in Study 1 and 16 in Study 2.… more
Date: May 2023
Creator: Murphy, Leah K.
Partner: UNT Libraries

The Impact of Including Teacher and School Characteristics on Predicting Value-Added Score Estimates

Description: Value-added models (VAMs) have become widely used in evaluating teacher accountability. The use of these models for high-stakes decisions making has been very controversial due to lack of consistency in classifying teachers as high performing or low performing. There is an abundance of research on the impact of various student level covariates on teacher value-added scores; however, less is known about the impact of teacher-level and school-level covariates. This study uses hierarchical linear … more
Date: May 2021
Creator: Allen, Lauren E.
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Class Enumeration and Parameter Bias in Growth Mixture Models with Misspecified Time-Varying Covariates: A Monte Carlo Simulation Study

Description: Growth mixture modeling (GMM) is a useful tool for examining both between- and within-persons change over time and uncovering unobserved heterogeneity in growth trajectories. Importantly, the correct extraction of latent classes and parameter recovery can be dependent upon the type of covariates used. Time-varying covariates (TVCs) can influence class membership but are scarcely included in GMMs as predictors. Other times, TVCs are incorrectly modeled as time-invariant covariates (TICs). Additi… more
Date: December 2020
Creator: Palka, Jayme M.
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Institutional Pluralism and the Organization's Response: A Case Study of Chinese Women's Ice Hockey

Description: In recent years, the sport of women's ice hockey is growing fast worldwide. Upon winning the bid to host the 2022 Winter Olympics, women's ice hockey in China started to develop rapidly. However, the development of women's ice hockey in China has encountered numerous challenges. These challenges include addressing traditional Chinese culture, gender norms, and the process of sport reform. This study used a qualitative case study methodology to examine the perspectives of Chinese women ice hocke… more
Date: May 2020
Creator: Li, Hongxin
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Reading and Mathematics Growth Patterns of High-Achieving Students: An Investigation of School-Year and Summer Trends

Description: Rambo-Hernandez and McCoach's analysis into the longitudinal growth of high-achieving students offered two conclusions about the reading growth of high achieving students: high-achieving students lose less ground in reading during the summer, but they exhibit less growth over the school year. This study will seek to replicate the reading results of the Rambo-Hernandez and McCoach's study and include an analysis of mathematics growth with initially high-achieving, third grade students in both th… more
Date: December 2022
Creator: Hurst, Lucas Thor
Partner: UNT Libraries

Measuring Creativity in Academic Writing

Description: The demand for a creative workforce has never been higher, yet schools struggle to teach and assess creativity among students predictably and efficiently. Compositions are an effective way to incorporate creativity across the curriculum; however, essays are time consuming for teachers to score for objective quality or subjective creativity. In this study, I explored a) if high creativity scores are related to high quality and sophistication in academic writing, and b) if extant text-mining tool… more
Date: December 2022
Creator: Nagel, Janessa Helen Bower
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Did the COVID-19 Pandemic Make Better Parents? A Qualitative Exploration of Parents' Experiences during an Historic Period

Description: Predicated on the literature, parenting practices are subject to change following high-impact events. This understandably applies to the COVID-19 pandemic, a calamity of sheer magnitude. Despite the presence of maladaptive parenting behaviors in the pandemic, upsides (e.g., compassionate parenting practices, strengthened child-parent bond) did transpire as well. The present study is focused on whether and how parental betterment occurred and unfolded during the pandemic. The explicit research g… more
Date: December 2022
Creator: Xiao, He
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

The Relationship between Racial Colorblindness and the Self-Reported Implementation of Multicultural Teaching Practices among Teachers of Gifted Students

Description: Culturally responsive instruction is recommended as a tool to help mitigate disparities in the recruitment and retention of culturally diverse students in gifted programs. However, the endorsement of colorblind racial ideology has been associated with lower multicultural teaching competency and the adoption of deficit perspectives among teachers. In addition to informing teachers' perceptions of students' abilities and potential, endorsing colorblind racial ideology may make it more difficult f… more
Date: December 2022
Creator: Ottwein, Jessica K.
Partner: UNT Libraries

Comparing Raw Score Difference, Multilevel Modeling, and Structural Equation Modeling Methods for Estimating Discrepancy in Dyads

Description: The current study focused on dyadic discrepancy, the difference between two individuals. A Monte Carlo simulation was used to compare three dyadic discrepancy estimation methods across a variety of potential research conditions, including variations on intraclass correlation, cluster number, reliability, effect size, and effect size variance. The methods compared were: raw score difference (RSD); empirical Bayes estimate of slope in multilevel modeling (EBD); and structural equation modeling es… more
Date: May 2020
Creator: McEnturff, Amber L
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Influence of Quiet Eye Self-Training on Internal Processes and Performance Outcomes

Description: Use and effectiveness of the quiet eye (QE) technique has been a topic of interest in sport, exercise, and performance psychology. The primary purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of QE self-training on college students' internal processes associated with performing a novel task. Specifically, college students' internal processes were examined to understand how QE self-training influenced performance on a novel aiming task. College students (N = 106; M = 21.84 ± 1.79) voluntar… more
Date: December 2021
Creator: Casey, Taylor BreAnn
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Measurement Invariance of a Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Symptoms Measure (PCL-5) in College Student and Amazon's Mechanical Turk Samples

Description: College student and Amazon's Mechanical TURK (MTURK) samples are regularly utilized in trauma research. Recent literature, however, has criticized these samples for not being generalizable to the general U.S. population. Measurement invariance (MI) using confirmatory factor analyses (CFA), is rarely utilized in trauma research, even though the analysis can determine whether groups are invariant across factor structure, factor loadings, item intercepts, and residual error variances on a given me… more
Date: August 2020
Creator: Bedford, Lee
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Teachers' Perceptions of Professional Development: A Mixed Methods Study

Description: Research has identified job context, specific attributes of professional development (PD), and perceived teacher input as factors that contribute to teachers' attitudes. This sequential mixed methods study tested those findings together and further investigated teachers' beliefs and attitudes about their own professional learning. The first phase of data collection included a 5-item attitude survey, demographic information, and two short-answer questions. Multiple regression analysis of the sam… more
Date: May 2020
Creator: Shurtleff, Kay
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Coaching Athletes with Post-Traumatic Stress: Exploring Trauma-Related Competencies and Coaching Efficacy

Description: The purpose of this study was twofold: (a) assess cycling coaches' trauma-related competencies, as measured by trauma knowledge (i.e., trauma-specific education, familiarity with post-traumatic stress [PTS]), stigma of persons with PTS (i.e., fear/dangerousness, help/interact, forcing treatment, negative emotions), and interpersonal skills (i.e., self-reported emotional intelligence, perceived quality of coach-athlete relationships); and (b) examine the influence that trauma knowledge and stigm… more
Date: August 2020
Creator: Leibovitz, Amanda Patricia
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Relationship between the Big Five and Creative Self-Beliefs in Undergraduates in Terms of College Enrollment and Major

Description: Supporting creativity in undergraduate education is important for the future development of society. To do this, an understanding of undergraduate characteristics is needed. A systematic literature review of the relationship between the Big Five personality factors and little-c creativity in undergraduates identified 19 studies. The creativity assessments within these investigations represented several conceptions of the construct with domain-general, self-reported measures of Person as most… more
Date: May 2020
Creator: Soles, Kathryn L.
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Mixed Development and Validation of an Authentic Assessment for Middle School Mathematics

Description: In response to concerns about using only standardized multiple-choice assessments, some school districts have moved to using alternative ratings of student achievement with authentic assessments. However, such assessments are often limited in terms of the psychometric validity data supporting their use. The present study mixed quantitative and qualitative methods to examine the validity, development, and refinement of an authentic rating approach currently in use in middle school mathematics c… more
Date: August 2020
Creator: Raadt, Jay Schyler
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Mothers' Parenting Stress in Chinese Immigrant Families: The Role of Fathers' Involvement and Social Support

Description: This study investigated the association between Chinese immigrant mothers' reports of parenting stress and two sources of parenting support: fathers' support and social support. Five independent-samples t-tests were first computed to examine whether there were discrepancies between Chinese immigrant mothers' and fathers' perceptions of fathers' involvement across five domains of fathers' involvement in early child care: (1) fathers' warmth and attunement; (2) control and process responsibility;… more
Date: August 2020
Creator: Zhang, Xun
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Self-Reported Feelings of Shame and Fear of Failure among High Ability Undergraduates

Description: Understanding how emotions influence motivation among students is critical to the talent development process. Research shows that certain emotions elicit an approach motive while other emotions elicit an avoidance motive. This study explored emotional disposition and fear of failure among undergraduates enrolled in honors college (n = 63) compared to undergraduates enrolled in regular college courses (n = 296). Results suggest that dispositional shame is positively correlated with fear of failu… more
Date: May 2020
Creator: Nyikos, Tara
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

A Mixed-Method Sequential Explanatory Study of Fundamental Motor Skills Competence of Underserved Preschool Children

Description: This dissertation investigated the roles of early childhood fundamental motor skills (FMS) competence on physical, cognitive, and psychosocial health outcomes among underserved preschoolers in Head Start, and examined parental influence on their children's FMS competence. An explanatory sequential mixed methodology was used to examine the predictive strength of FMS competence on physical, cognitive, and psychosocial health outcomes among 216 underserved preschoolers from six Head Start centers … more
Date: December 2020
Creator: Lee, Joon Young
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Caregiver Knowledge of Risk Factors Associated with Complex Congenital Heart Disease and Quality of Life Outcomes

Description: Congenital heart disease is the most common birth defect globally, affecting both children and their families. Twenty –five percent of children experiencing a CHD birth defect are diagnosed with complex CHD (cCHD), signifying critical heart dysfunction requiring one or more open-heart surgeries during the first year of life. With medical advances, cCHD survival rates have almost tripled in the last three decades. This has resulted in an increase in the number of morbidities associated with cCHD… more
Date: December 2020
Creator: Hutchinson, Jessica B
Partner: UNT Libraries
open access

Early Intervention Referral and Service Frequency for Children with Visual Impairments: Experiences from the Field

Description: The purpose of this study was to examine differences in early intervention (EI) referral and service frequency for children with blindness or visual impairment (BVI) and gather information about the practices and experiences of vision professionals across the United States. The study focused on obtaining data from certified teachers of students with visual impairment (CTVI) and certified orientation and mobility specialists (COMS) in the United States. Information collected included descripti… more
Date: May 2021
Creator: Bishop, Audra Lea
Partner: UNT Libraries
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