The Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) was used to predict the major field choices of students at four large universities. Major field was coded on a science-nonscience continuum, and it could be predicted almost as accurately as grade point average. The SAT mathematical subtest (SAT-M) received virtually all of the weight in the prediction equation. Semipartial correlation was performed to determine if the aforementioned prediction was a mere artifact of sex differences. The results strongly suggested that (a) mathematical ability is an important determinant of major field choice, and (b) the male-female difference in major field choice is largely mediated by the sex difference in mathematical ability. A remedy was suggested for female underrepresentation in science fields.
College grading is a deeper topic than it at first appears. It can be investigated and described on several levels. On one level, studying college grading is equivalent to studying the behavior of college instructors. Such an investigation would focus on the input factors or antecedents (e.g., student ability levels, work habits, etc.) that influence grading as well as the characteristics of the persons assigning grades.Another level at which college grading can be investigated concerns the consequences of grading practices. These consequences can be studied for their effects on individuals or on aggregates. The latter approach would assess the systemwide effects of grading practices upon the whole institution, including student enrollments, major field choice, and faculty hiring.The authors believe that the antecedents and consequences of college grading are inextricably tied together by a personal characteristic of college instructors. This characteristic is so pervasive among college instructors (and perhaps people in general) as to be considered an almost inevitable factor in college grading process. The characteristic to which we refer is the phenomenon of adaptation level (Helson, 1947(Helson, , 1948.Adaptation level, briefly, concerns the "anchoring" effects of background stimuli upon the perception of focal stimuli. This concept, originally developed to account for psychophysical data, can be translated into the language of college grading. When the performance of the individual student is considered as a focal stimulus, the performances of all other students in the class can be considered as background stimuli against which the individual's performance is judged. Thus, grading standards would be partly determined by the ability level of the student population. If, for example, the ability level declines without an accompanying decline in average grades, then grading standards have "fallen" (or become less "stringent").
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College women have been believed to overachieve relative to college men. For a given ability profile, college women, on the average, achieve higher grades than men. A number of personality and work habit explanations have been invoked to account for this phenomenon. The present investigation sought to control sex differences in major field, through semipartial correlation, to determine whether female overachievement is an artifact of major field choice. The multiple regressions of grade point average on the Verbal and Mathematical sections of the Scholastic Aptitude Test were calculated for over 13,000 male and female students at four major universities. Differences in regression intercepts, which imply overachievement, were eliminated or drastically reduced when major field choice was controlled through semipartial correlations. Results indicate that the sex difference in overachievement is probably an artifact of the sex difference in major field choice.
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