Word/World Knowledge: The Prediction of College GPA.

While the prediction of college grade point average (GPA) has been extensively investigated, research results seem inconclusive. Recent developments in the realm of intelligence have emphasized word knowledge and world knowledge. These two components were investigated relative to college GPA in a group of elementary and secondary student teachers (N=137) and in a group of college freshmen (N=36). Subjects were administered the Nelson-Denny Reading Test to measure reading rate and reading comprehension, the Peabody Individual Achievement Test (PIAT) to measure general world knowledge, and the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test Revised (PPVT-R) to measure word knowledge. Further information was gathered to provide values for the subjects' high school and college GPA's. Data analysis from both groups provided similar findings: high school GPA and the score from the PPVT-R were the best predictors of college GPA with high school GPA being the best single predictor. These findings suggest that past behavior is a good predictor of future behavior. Since the addition of scores from the PPVT-R provided an even better prediction model, word knowledge may be a significant factor in predicting college GPA. The fact that both the PPVT-R and the PIAT, tests designed for high school students, proved difficult for some subjects may raise other issues of concern to educators and researchers alike. (NRB)