Effects of Nonintellective Student Behaviour Upon Essay Grades.

Two experiments were undertaken to study the effects of nonintellective behavior upon essay grades. In the first experiment teachers were exposed to information depicting a stimulus boy as either aggressive or non-aggressive. Following this information subject marked either a creative or noncreative essay. The subjects consisted of eight teachers employed by two Canadian school districts. The second experiment was essentially the same, except the tidyness of handwriting was varied instead of the aggressiveness of the student's behavior. The subjects consisted of forty teachers employed by two different Canadian school districts. Both experiments suggest that undesirable behavior only biased essay grades if the essay is noncreative. In general, the results suggest that teachers' impressions can influence the grade assigned to an essay. Essays which conform with normative expectations of teachers are of low information value, and the marking of such an essay would be influenced by prior information. (Author/BW)