Childhood malaria in the Gambia: a case-study in model-based geostatistics

Summary. The paper develops a spatial generalized linear mixed model to describe the variation in the prevalence of malaria among a sample of village resident children in the Gambia. The response from each child is a binary indicator of the presence of malarial parasites in a blood sample. The model includes terms for the effects of child level covariates (age and bed net use), village level covariates (inclusion or exclusion from the primary health care system and greenness of surrounding vegetation as derived from satellite information) and separate components for residual spatial and non-spatial extrabinomial variation. The results confirm and quantify the progressive increase in prevalence with age, and the protective effects of bed nets. They also show that the extrabinomial variation is spatially structured, suggesting an environmental effect rather than variation in familial susceptibility. Neither inclusion in the primary health care system nor the greenness of the surrounding vegetation appeared to affect the prevalence of malaria. The method of inference was Bayesian using vague priors and a Markov chain Monte Carlo implementation.     

Attachment and joint attention in infants: The role of expectation

Previous research highlighted the correlation between parent–infant's attachment quality and joint attention skills. However, the underlying mechanisms of this relationship are still unclear. The aim of this study was to assess whether it is by mediating the expectation component in Internal Working Models that the quality of attachment style can affect joint attention. At first, 12- to 20-month-old infants were classified into secure and insecure groups using the Strange Situation Procedure. On a following day, using a violation-of-expectation paradigm, infants were habituated to two joint attention videos. Finally, the mean looking time duration of secure and insecure infants were compared with each other between two “divergent attention” and “joint attention” videos. Infants looked longer for divergent attention videos suggesting they did have expectation regarding the appropriate response in triadic interactions. In line with our main hypothesis, secure infants, but not insecure ones, looked longer in the divergent attention situation when an attachment-related context was present, revealing the possible mediating role of “expectations” in the correlation between attachment and joint attention.     

Large-Scale Observational Evidence of Cross-Cultural Differences in Facial Behavior

Self-report studies have found evidence that cultures differ in the display rules they have for facial expressions (i.e., for what is appropriate for different people at different times). However, observational studies of actual patterns of facial behavior have been rare and typically limited to the analysis of dozens of participants from two or three regions. We present the first large-scale evidence of cultural differences in observed facial behavior, including 740,984 participants from 12 countries around the world. We used an Internet-based framework to collect video data of participants in two different settings: in their homes and in market research facilities. Using computer vision algorithms designed for this dataset, we measured smiling and brow furrowing expressions as participants watched television ads. Our results reveal novel findings and provide empirical evidence to support theories about cultural and gender differences in display rules. Participants from more individualist cultures displayed more brow furrowing overall, whereas smiling depended on both culture and setting. Specifically, participants from more individualist countries were more expressive in the facility setting, while participants from more collectivist countries were more expressive in the home setting. Female participants displayed more smiling and less brow furrowing than male participants overall, with the latter difference being more pronounced in more individualist countries. This is the first study to leverage advances in computer science to enable large-scale observational research that would not have been possible using traditional methods.     

Cultural change and attitude change: An assessment of postrevolutionary marriage and family attitudes in Iran

This report is aimed at investigating beliefs and intentions of Iranian adolescents regarding marriage and family building approximately four years after the Islamic Revolution, which brought substantial political and cultural changes. Differences associated with gender and parental education were found in beliefs and intentions regarding marriage and family building. Also, the sample seemed to hold more traditional cultural values than did a comparable prerevolutionary sample of youth who were from the same geographical location and were of the same sex and parental educational background. However, it was found that even the groups from the lowest educational background showed some degree of nontraditional attitudes and intentions regarding marriage and family. Interpreting the findings in light of cultural observations and attitude change theory, it is argued that a certain degree of real attitude change has occurred, and is continuing, in the nontraditional direction among educated youth.     

Survivorship and fertility schedules of two Sumatran tortoise beetles,Aspidomorpha miliaris andA. sanctaecrucis (Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae) under laboratory conditions

Summary Two species of tortoise beetles,Aspidomorpha miliaris (AM) andA. sanctaecrucis (AS) feeding on a shrub-like morning glory,Ipomoea carnea, were reared under laboratory conditions to study their survivorship and fertility schedules. AM and AS required 34–39 days and 30–37, respectively, for the development of the immature stages. The mean longevity of the males was 88.4 days in AM and 63.8 in AS, and that of females was 87.9 days in AM and 83.3 in AS. The mean length of the pre-reproductive period (27.2 days in AM and 33.8 in AS) was much longer than that of the post-reproductive period (10.9 days in AM and 14.3 in AS). Females laid eggs at a nearly constant rate throughout their reproductive period. The reproductive valueV _x /V ₀ of the two species remained high for most of their adult life, as a result of prolonged survivorship and fertility periods. The total number of eggs produced per female was 442.9 (AM) and 80.1 (AS). The intrinsic rate of natural increaser was 0.070 (AM) and 0.044 (AS) per capita per day. The prolonged reproductive schedules, coupled with strong dispersal power, of these species no doubt have an adaptive value for living in highly disturbed tropical environments, where rainfall is ample but unpredictable and food resources are available throughout the year in a wide area, but distributed in widely flung patches. Contributions to the knowledge of population dynamics of tortoise beetles in Sumatra 3. Contribution No. 33 of Sumatra Nature Study (Entomology). Partly supported by Grants from Japan Society for Promotion of Science for JSPS-DGHE Scientific Cooperation (1980, 1982) and Grants-in-Aid for Overseas Scientific Survey from Ministry of Education, Science and Culture of Japan (Nos. 56041027 and 58041030).     

Perceptions of the processes of radicalisation and de-radicalisation among British South Asian Muslims in a post-industrial city

This paper presents the findings of a qualitative study exploring the perceptions of British South Asian Muslims in relation to the pathways towards radicalisation and the challenges of community leadership in relation to de-radicalisation. The study is based on in-depth interviews, using an ethnographic methodological framework, with a purposive sample of 30 Muslim men and women, including senior political figures, community leaders, religious figures and young Muslims (aged 18–25) from across the city of Birmingham, UK. The fieldwork was carried out between September 2005 and May 2007. Respondents reflected a general perspective that regards social exclusion, Islamophobia, lack of effective theological and political leadership, regressive anti-terror law and geo-political events as principal factors in the radicalisation and the de-radicalisation of British Muslims. These findings provide important insights into Muslims in Britain in relation to questions of ‘radicalism’ and politics, and they have specific implications for research, policy and practice in this area.     

Association Models for Multi-Dimensional Cross-Classifications of Ordinal Variables

Models are formulated for describing associations among ordinal variables in multidimensional tables.Uniform association and uniform interaction models occur as special cases in which equal-interval scores are assigned to levels of the variables.The models described are extensions of ones proposed by Goodman (1979).     

On the bivariate weighted exponential distribution based on the generalized exponential distribution

In this paper, we introduce a bivariate weighted exponential distribution based on the generalized exponential distribution. This class of distributions generalizes the bivariate distribution with weighted exponential marginals (BWE). We derive different properties of this new distribution. It is a four-parameter distribution, and the maximum-likelihood estimator of unknown parameters cannot be obtained in explicit forms. One data set has been re-analyzed and it is observed that the proposed distribution provides better fit than the BWE distribution.     

Objective Bayesian Analysis for Log-logistic Distribution

In this article, Bayesian approach is applied to estimate the parameters of Log-logistic distribution under reference prior and Jeffreys’ prior. The reference prior is derived and it is found that the reference prior is also a second-order matching priors as for the case of any parameter of interest. The Bayesian estimators cannot be obtained in explicit forms. Metropolis within Gibbs sampling algorithm is used to obtain the Bayesian estimators. The Bayesian estimates are compared with the maximum likelihood estimates via simulation study. A real dataset is considered for illustrative purposes.