In this article, research conducted in the United States since 1987 on the effects of homework is summarized. Studies are grouped into four research designs. The authors found that all studies, regardless of type, had design flaws. However, both within and across design types, there was generally consistent evidence for a positive influence of homework on achievement. Studies that reported simple homework–achievement correlations revealed evidence that a stronger correlation existed (a) in Grades 7–12 than in K–6 and (b) when students rather than parents reported time on homework. No strong evidence was found for an association between the homework–achievement link and the outcome measure (grades as opposed to standardized tests) or the subject matter (reading as opposed to math). On the basis of these results and others, the authors suggest future research.

A meta-analysis of 41 studies examined the effect of choice on intrinsic motivation and related outcomes in a variety of settings with both child and adult samples. Results indicated that providing choice enhanced intrinsic motivation, effort, task performance, and perceived competence, among other outcomes. Moderator tests revealed the effect of choice on intrinsic motivation was stronger (a) for instructionally irrelevant choices compared to choices made between activities, versions of a task, rewards, and instructionally relevant options, (b) when 2 to 4 successive choices were given, (c) when rewards were not given after the choice manipulation, (d) when participants given choice were compared to the most controlling forms of control groups, (e) for children compared to adults, (f) for designs that yoked choice and control conditions compared to matched designs in which choice was reduced or designs in which nonyoked, nonmatched controls were used, and (g) when the experiment was conducted in a laboratory embedded in a natural setting. Implications for future research and applications to real-world settings are discussed.

New emphasis is being placed on the importance of parent involvement in children's education. In a synthesis of research on the effects of parent involvement in homework, a meta-analysis of 14 studies that manipulated parent training for homework involvement reveals that training parents to be involved in their child's homework results in (a) higher rates of homework completion, (b) fewer homework problems, and (c) possibly, improved academic performance among elementary school children. A meta-analysis of 22 samples from 20 studies correlating parent involvement and achievementrelated outcomes reveals (a) positive associations for elementary school and high school students but a negative association for middle school students, (b) a stronger association for parent rule-setting compared with other involvement strategies, and (c) a negative association for mathematicsachievement but a positive association for verbal achievement outcomes. The results suggest that different types of parent involvement in homework have different relationships to achievement and that the type of parent involvement changes as children move through the school grades.

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Like all forms of empirical inquiry, research syntheses can be carried out in ways that lead to more or less valid inferences about the phenomenon under study. This synthesis of syntheses (a) examined the methods employed in the syntheses of the effects of after-school programs (ASPs) and determined how closely they conformed to what is defined as best practice for research synthesis, (b) compared the inferences drawn from the ASP research literature by each synthesis with the inferences that plausibly could be made from the data they covered, and (c) determined the points of consistency across the syntheses with regard to both potentially valid and potentially invalid conclusions. It was found that the 12 syntheses used highly divergent methods, varying in problem definitions, search strategies, inclusion criteria for individual studies, and techniques for drawing conclusions about the cumulative evidence. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.