Good Morning Karl:

I don't know the answer to the norms question but I wouldn't be at all surprised if the annual mean has shifted. Over the years there has been much more emphasis
on quant achievement as a better estimate of 'aptitude'.

I do much advising of undergrads on getting into grad school and over the last
20 years have attended as many panel discussions and forums at professional
conferences as I could, to find out what it is that grad schools are looking
for. Without exception, when the GRE comes up, it is the quant score that is
emphasized as more important than the verbal.

Thus, I suspect students are preparing better for the quant exam, AND I believe
that it is actually easier to "prepare" for that part of the exam. You can
certainly cram a good review of basic and advanced college algebra, by taking a good review course; but the verbal skills, I think (no data) would require much
more time to build. For example, there are tricks for vocab, like learning
latin and greek prefixes and suffixes, but bottom line: correct grammar and
syntax are more likely to reflect life long habits; and much vocab, as assessed
on such tests, is idiosyncratic.

Of course I am fairly certain that Robert Sternberg has published data showing
that the GRE is, in fact, not a very strong predictor of success in grad
school. Other factors, such as creativity, are more important.

Annette


Quoting "Wuensch, Karl L." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

I have a test interpretation query. I just checked the ETS site for normative data on the GRE. I was quite surprised to see that the mean on the verbal section is now 469 (SD = 120) and on the quantitative section the mean is now 597 (SD = 148). When I took it, in 1972, the mean on the verbal section was 497 (SD = 125) and on the quantitative section the mean was 512 (SD = 134). That is quite a change in norms, especially on the quantitative section. Does ETS score the GRE in a way that makes scores comparable (in terms of the measured latent variable, aptitude) across the years, like they used to do with the SAT? Put another way, does the change in norms indicate that those applying to graduate school now have considerably better quantitative skills but somewhat lower verbal skills than did those applying to graduate school back in the 70's?

Cheers,

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Karl L. Wuensch, Department of Psychology,
East Carolina University, Greenville NC  27858-4353
Voice:  252-328-9420     Fax:  252-328-6283
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://core.ecu.edu/psyc/wuenschk/klw.htm




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Annette Kujawski Taylor, Ph. D.
Department of Psychology
University of San Diego
5998 Alcala Park
San Diego, CA 92110
[EMAIL PROTECTED]



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