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This article examines the differences between using staple scales and semantic differential techniques when conducting marketing research. The authors examines the utilization of scaling techniques during research interviews and present a comparison of semantic differentials with other methods used to obtain data from respondents. They discuss some of the differences between the Staple scale and the semantic differential method. Their findings indicated that the Staple scale could be influenced by the method of administration while the semantic differential method was not.

The article discusses readership studies of business periodicals. The author questions the usefulness of mail questionnaires designed to aggregate facts about respondents' behavior, in particular the ability of these tests to measure the magazine reading behavior of business publications readers. According to the author, the research based on data from questionnaires should not be generally discounted, rather researchers should pay close attention to the validity of a study in order to determine its effective interpretation.

A conference paper concerned with the validity of advertising effectiveness measurements is presented. The author notes that the measurements in question are not geared toward the visibility of advertisements, but rather their effectiveness in creating in the consumer an association with the product being advertised.

The development and application of the cosmopolitan-local construct is critically examined from a taxonomic perspective. The authors conclude that the factor analytic studies of Gouldner (1958) and Goldberg et ad. (1965), to define the dimensions of the construct do not support Merton's (1957) and Gouldner's (1957) earlier conceptualization. Recent applications of the construct in organizational studies are examined, and serious problems of operationalizing the construct and sample composition of the studies are discussed. It is recommended that further research is needed on the construct itself, and that while such research is in process the construct should not be used as an explanatory or descriptive variable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines a common problem faced by researchers conducting empirical social research in complex human organizations. The author asserts that gaining access to organizations for research purposes hinders the job of the researcher. The author discusses how he has overcome this problems and provides tips for researchers in the field. He discusses the systematic approach for conducting a research study and outlines how to use this method. He relates his experience of gaining access to public agencies to conduct research in order to help fellow researchers conduct studies.

The article reports on survey and polling considerations which are critical to have unbiased and representative results. The three primary considerations are to restrict questions to subjects which the respondents would have adequate knowledge and information to form an opinion, phrasing questions to be clear and reduce bias, and selecting a survey sample which will closely represent the entire group. Hypothetical questions rarely yield valuable answers, respondents will rarely divulge personal and private information, and random or trivial questions do not return useful answers. Psychologists are the best people to write survey questions.

The article presents a reply by J. Scott Armstrong to the comment of Douglas C. Crocker about the article involving the exploratory analysis of marketing data. Armstrong stated that there seem to be an implication that the researchers were biased against regression. Crocker doubts whether comparisons of methods need to be made. Armstrong and his colleagues feel that the comparison of alternative methods is essential to scientific advancement and that they tried to avoid the possibility of being bias by making decisions on the nature of the test and of the criterion prior to examining the data.

The article examines the criteria used to determine the existence of unfair test discrimination for female clerical workers in the United States. In recent years there has been considerable controversy concerning the use of psychological tests for the purpose of selecting minority group members into jobs. At the center of this controversy is the concept of unfair test discrimination. J.S. Kirkpatrick, R.B. Ewen, R.B. Barrett, and R.A. Katzell have outlined two major considerations with regard to the issue of unfair test discrimination. First, they point out that a test may be differentially valid for subgroups of individuals. Second, they indicate that regardless of the validity of a test, unfair test discrimination will occur if the predicted criterion scores of one subgroup are lower than their actual criterion scores. Kirkpatrick and his coworkers found, for example, that on some occasions tests were unfair for whites but not for Negroes, while on others the reverse was true. Similarly, instances were found where unfair test discrimination existed for both Negroes and whites and occasions where the opposite situation--no unfair test discrimination for both groups--was found to exist.

The article comments on the article about the assessment of the predictive validity of the Illinois Test of Psycholinguistic Abilities (ITPA) by Alfred Hirshoren. The author discussed the five major conclusions drawn by Hirshoren. The total language score of the ITPA, at least at the kindergarten level is valid. ITPA is use as a diagnostic tool in special education classes, classed of retarded, handicapped, emotionally disturbed and others. The last majot conclusion of Hirshoren which states that including the Standard-Binet IQ as a predictor variable does not improve upon the predictions of future achievement obtained by using ITPA is lacking.

The article evaluates the validity and reliability of Illinois test of psycholinguistic abilities (ITPA). The goal of differential diagnosis based on profile analysis has not yet been reached because the reliability and the validity of the test have not been established. ITPA can be a useful instrument since it can show how subscale performance is related to educationally relevant behaviors. Using the ITPA in research projects must be conducted in such a way that information about the test is gained along with information subjects.

Recent criticism of the examination system and suggestions for removing certain of its defects are here reviewed by a former member of the Institute's staff. The confusion of function attaching to most examinations is commented on, and the question is raised whether they should be concerned with the candidate's general culture or only with his vocational usefulness. In either case the development of vocational psychology is clearly relevant to the problem of examinations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the first of the two articles below, Dr. Moorrees gives a general survey of the work of the Psychological Department at Messrs. Rowntree's, with special reference to the devising, application and validation of selection tests. Detailed correlations between test results and efficiency are unobtainable, owing to the constantly changing conditions and to the difficulty of obtaining objective criteria of efficiency. Since the introduction of tests, however, (as shown in Dr. Northcott's paper) the proportion of girls dismissed for inefficiency has been more than halved. This figure would have been far more striking but for the fact that in the years 1925 and 1926 shortage of labour made it necessary to engage applicants irrespective of the test results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a discussion related to detection of deception technique admitted as evidence. As the result of an agreement and stipulation entered into between prosecution and defense counsel in a Wisconsin case, State versus Loniello and Grignano, Judge Clayton F. Van Pelt of the Circuit Court of Columbia County recently admitted in evidence so-called "lie-detector" records together with expert testimony concerning their interpretation. The instrument which was used in making the tests upon the defendants is known as the Keeler Polygraph, and the witness who conducted the examinations and who explained the records and his interpretation thereof to the jury was Professor Leonardo Keeler of the Scientific Crime Detection Laboratory of Northwestern University School of Law. This case represents, to the writer's knowledge, the first time in which a court of law has permitted the use of such evidence for the consideration of a jury. Upon several occasions, however, results of this nature had been utilized by judges in civil and minor criminal cases.

The article examines the adequacy of the Form X of the Abstraction Test for use with mentally retarded (MR) children between the ages of six and seventeen. The method is administered to a group of MRs and performed a series of operations on the data. The operations are concerned with: (1) an item analysis which determines the relative difficulty of the items as well as their discriminating power and their uniqueness, (2) the reliability of the test, and (3) the validity of the test. In conclusion, the test is adequate for use with mentally retarded children between the ages of six and seventeen.

The article discusses a study on the construct validity of three contemporary measures of achievement related motives. It mentions that the relationships between behavioral variables and the variable called Achievement on the Personal Preference Schedule do not support the inference that strength of motive to achieve success is being measured by the test. The results of the study highlight the importance of discovering why different methods of measuring apparently the same human motive do not yield comparable results.

The article presents a study that examined the roles and patterns of symptomatic behaviors. According to the author, the study is a contribution to a system of psychiatric classification. The study involved statistics of previous medical records, which were examined to identify the relationships of symptomatic reactions, as well as a test of the stability of the categories. It included 604 case records, which when examined resulted to 46 discrete presenting symptoms. The context of developmental theory has been used to interpret the validity of the categories of the symptomatical behavior.

The article cites a study that aims to determine the reliability of psychiatric diagnosis in the U.S. The study is focused on determining the level of reliability of psychiatric diagnosis relative to the criteria used by individual psychiatrists. The study made use of 426 patients of Norwich State Hospital wherein during a six-month period were diagnosed by two psychiatrists, during the first week and third week of hospitalization. Results of the study indicated that a satisfactory reliability has been demonstrated in some cases of psychiatric diagnosis, however, the demonstrated reliability has no implication in terms of semantic validity or usefulness.

The article presents a study of on rotation errors made by brain-damaged children compared to familial children who had no reported brain damage on the Scheerer Stick Test and the Bender Gestalt Test. The author aims to determine whether rotations are errors that can be predicted from one visual-motor task to another, or whether rotations on the given tests are situational errors unrelated to other types of performance.

It is contended that the Rorschach method is successful in analyzing the personality of children, that it permits an understanding of their "private worlds" and offers an insight into the underlying mechanisms of personality. In child deviates, it suggests therapeutic approaches; it gauges the effectiveness of treatment and the extent of recovery. In short, it works. Despite the subjectivity of the scoring, the sparsity of the norms, the reliance on clinical validation, the interpretation in terms of results from adult or psychiatric material, the method, from the pragmatic point of view, is valid for use with normal children. Because of such clinical and pragmatic evidence, it is justifiable perhaps to apply the Rorschach method in the clinical field, for there all methods and procedures available to the clinician, including the interview and personal and subjective judgments, are put to service. There can be no doubt that the Rorschach method in individual diagnosis of children can yield important information. But if the method is to be used as an instrument of research in studies of children, it must be established scientifically as a valid instrument. Thus the problem of the extent to which Rorschach results are valid for the normal child is of importance. In the present state of development, many results are inconclusive and invalid, and conclusions for younger children, especially, are of doubtful value. Results cannot be accepted as anything but tentative where the number of cases is small, the technique is not described, sexes are not differentiated, groups are casually compared, controls are not used, and standards of scoring and norms which are based on adult or psychiatric groups are applied. To be serviceable as an instrument of research, results must meet scientific requirements. Thus it may be said that studies based on the Rorschach method in the field of the normal child have been valuable in suggesting promising hypotheses and in pointing the... [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a study which aims to stimulate publication of the information validity from personnel selection studies. It says that the essential problem of the study is to improve the existing psychological test battery used in sales trainees selection. It states the major concern of the authors in test publication with the use of Psychological Business Research and Sales Aptitude Inventory. It mentions that factors scores are being obtained for each of the rated salesmen which are used along with the sales trainees' rankings. Study reveals that the prediction of several dimensions of performance is a desirable way in defining the selection problem of the company.

Summary M easures of intelligence, supervisory ability, initiative, self-assurance, and perceived occupational level were obtained on eleven groups of individuals in various jobs ranging from line to upper management positions. It was found that the higher the level of the job the higher the score on the five tests and the higher the validity of the tests. It was concluded that apparently these traits identify the individuals who seek or are placed in higher positions, and that the higher the position the more critical these traits are in determining job success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]