there are two major theories of measurement in psychometrics: classical test theory (ctt) and item-response theory (irt). despite its widespread and long use, ctt has a number of shortcomings, which make it problematic to be used for practical and theoretical purposes. irt tries to solve these shortcomings, and provide better and more dependable answers. one of the applications of irt is the as...

building on previous studies on intellectual features and learners’ grammar learning, the present study aimed at investigating whether intelligence criterion had any impact on efl learners’ english grammar learning across two intelligence levels. in the current study, the participants were divided into two experimental and control groups by administration of raven i.q. test. this led to the for...

due to the limiting workspace of parallel manipulator and regarding to finding the trajectory planning of singularity free at workspace is difficult, so finding a best solution that can develop a technique to determine the singularity-free zones in the workspace of parallel manipulators is highly important. in this thesis a simple and new technique are presented to determine the maximal singula...

data envelopment analysis (dea) is a powerful tool for measuring relative efficiency of organizational units referred to as decision making units (dmus). in most cases dmus have network structures with internal linking activities. traditional dea models, however, consider dmus as black boxes with no regard to their linking activities and therefore do not provide decision makers with the reasons...

what has been discussed here has been a study of international immigration law. this branch of law has not been a major player in the field of international law. no collective law exists, and no codification has been carried out as yet. however, the need for such a set of laws has forced the international community to pay more attention to this issue. the need for a better life in the so-call...

today, the route for economic development in most countries is the same as international open competitive economy. economic institutes well known that supportive public economy belonged on the past and they may compete in the global economy. it is obvious that if they have no competitive potency or not familiar with competition technique, they may be devastated. banking system aims to collect t...

august wilson is undoubtedly one of the rare black playwrights whose works have attracted streams of attention and worldwide audience. the present study aims at analyzing fences and piano lesson which are two of the most successful plays in his pittsburgh cycle from the perspective of michel foucault’s theories and ideas. studying these two plays from foucault’s perspective opens new windows in...

abstract this study aimed at investigating the impact of etymology strategy instruction on the development of vocabulary of iranian intermediate efl learners. etymology, knowledge of origin of words, roots, and affixes, has proved to be a controversial issue and a question of long debate with regard to its impact on the process of vocabulary learning. this study employed etymology strategy in ...

abstract: advertisements are the most accessible type of authentic materials, and this is one reason why they are used more and more in english teaching classes. for this cause, studies in the field of advertisements are very widespread nowadays. for pun is one aspect which makes advertisements more interesting, it is used more than before in advertisements. use of puns makes an advertisement m...

this study investigated how group formation method, namely student-selected vs. teacher-assigned, influences the results of the community model of teaching creative writing; i.e., group dynamics and group outcome (the quality of performance). the study adopted an experimental comparison group and microgenetic research design to observe the change process over a relatively short period of time. ...