Tail Behavior of the Failure Rate Functions of Mixtures

The tail behavior of the failure rate of mixtures of lifetime distributions is studied. A typical result is that if the failure rate of the strongest component of the mixture decreases to a limit, then the failure rate of the mixture decreases to the same limit. For a class of distributions containing the gamma distributions this result can be improved in the sense that the behavior of the failure rate of the mixture asymptotically mirrors that of the strongest component in whether it decreases or increases to a limit. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Developing a Social Protection Index for Asia

Social protection is increasingly seen as an important tool for poverty reduction, but to date there have been few quantitative cross‐country assessments of social protection provision. This article develops a social protection index that systematically and consistently quantifies activities at the national level. Four summary indicators representing the cost, coverage, poverty targeting and impact are scaled and weighted to produce an additive index of the overall level of social protection provision. The index is calculated for six very different Asian countries: Bangladesh, Indonesia, Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan and Vietnam. Considerable contrasts are revealed between their levels of social protection provision.     

Standard errors for the parameters of graphical Gaussian models

The comparison of an estimated parameter to its standard error, the Wald test, is a well known procedure of classical statistics. Here we discuss its application to graphical Gaussian model selection. First we derive the Fisher information matrix and its inverse about the parameters of any graphical Gaussian model. Both the covariance matrix and its inverse are considered and a comparative analysis of the asymptotic behaviour of their maximum likelihood estimators (m.l.e.s) is carried out. Then we give an example of model selection based on the standard errors. The method is shown to produce almost identical inference to likelihood ratio methods in the example considered.     

A CAUTIONARY NOTE ON ENVIRONMENTAL ECONOMICS

Environmental questions have become a permanent feature of the political landscape in contemporary Australia and now play a significant role in election campaigns at both state and federal levels. Indeed, one of the most significant policy debates in the 1996 Federal election focussed on the environmental policy proposed by the Liberal/National Party coalition, which sought to fund a host of environmental programs from the proceeds of a part privatisation of Telstra. The trade-offs involved in this policy have generated substantial opposition to it and served to underline the prominence of environmental questions in Australian politics. Despite the importance of ‘the environment’ in popular thought, public debate is still typically characterised by ‘feel good’ policy announcements by politicians, sensationalist media reporting and deceptive claims by some environmental interest groups. Whilst progress has undoubtedly been made, the result has often been a plethora of inchoate and frequently conflicting policies. Not surprisingly this ‘muddle through’ approach has produced numerous instances of government intervention not only failing to meet its planned objectives but also generating unintended consequences.     

Varieties of “Fundamentalism”: a Conceptual and Empirical Analysis of Two Protestant Denominations*

Many behavioral science studies of religious fundamentalism are seriously hampered by conceptual confusion. The major source of much of this confusion is the lack of a coherent sociological definition and theoretical context for the term fundamentalism. We propose a Parsonian definition of Fundamentalism, which is interpreted in the context of a theory of evolutionary social change. The methodological implications of this approach are identified and then applied in a survey research study of the lay leaders of two historically related denominations, the Disciples of Christ and the Church of Christ. Our factor analysis of 25 questionnaire items suggests there are three types of Fundamentalism. Socio-economic variables explain some of the variation in the Fundamentalism scores, but denominational affiliation explains more. Our findings suggest that future research should use denomination-specific indices of Fundamentalism.     

Careful The Tale You Tell Fairy tales,drama and moral education

SUMMARY: In this article, I examine theories which argue both for and against the educational potential of fairy tales, with special attention to the field of moral learning. I conclude that, in the contemporary world, stories have a particular importance for such learning but that the hidden moral values conveyed by many traditional tales may well be disquieting for a teacher. I propose that educational drama offers an appropriate pedagogy for exploring such values with children and describe in some detail a case study, in which I used a version of a traditional Hindu tale for these purposes. I offer a brief analysis on how the strategies employed by drama teachers can be harnessed for moral educational purposes and suggest that drama can offer children much needed opportunities to actively and creatively engage with stories and their values in a communal framework.