AN APPLICATION OF ITEM-EXAMINEE SAMPLING TO SCALING ATTITUDES

The post mortem item-examinee sampling investigation described herein explored the feasibility of using item-examinee sampling to estimate scale values denoting degree of affect toward stimuli when measured by the method of paired-comparisons. Results indicate that such scale values can be approximated satisfactorily through item-examinee sampling. Defining one observation as the response made by one examinee to one item, the similarity between the estimated scale values and normative scale values increased generally with increases in the number of observations acquired by the sampling plan.     

Educational Foundations for Environmental Effectiveness

The paper combines findings from three sources: an international workshop on the environmentally educated engineer, research on the characteristics of the effective engineer and an early-level undergraduate course for civil engineers which aims at laying down an educational foundation for the education of environmentally effective engineers. The main findings are that there is a need for a more general education for some engineers, that an ability to understand and deal with complex systems is a key element for environmental effectiveness, that there is no correlation between engineering effectiveness and the degree of educational attainment, and that the characteristics of effective engineers can be learnt, but are not normally taught in engineering institutions.