Statistical testing strategies for assessing treatment efficacy and marker accuracy in phase III trials

When a candidate predictive marker is available, but evidence on its predictive ability is not sufficiently reliable, all‐comers trials with marker stratification are frequently conducted. We propose a framework for planning and evaluating prospective testing strategies in confirmatory, phase III marker‐stratified clinical trials based on a natural assumption on heterogeneity of treatment effects across marker‐defined subpopulations, where weak rather than strong control is permitted for multiple population tests. For phase III marker‐stratified trials, it is expected that treatment efficacy is established in a particular patient population, possibly in a marker‐defined subpopulation, and that the marker accuracy is assessed when the marker is used to restrict the indication or labelling of the treatment to a marker‐based subpopulation, ie, assessment of the clinical validity of the marker. In this paper, we develop statistical testing strategies based on criteria that are explicitly designated to the marker assessment, including those examining treatment effects in marker‐negative patients. As existing and developed statistical testing strategies can assert treatment efficacy for either the overall patient population or the marker‐positive subpopulation, we also develop criteria for evaluating the operating characteristics of the statistical testing strategies based on the probabilities of asserting treatment efficacy across marker subpopulations. Numerical evaluations to compare the statistical testing strategies based on the developed criteria are provided.     

互动视角下构式压制和承继的合力机制——基于羡余否定构式“好不X”封闭语料库的研究

构式与其组构成分间的互动关系一直是构式语法关注的核心问题之一。Goldberg在构式语法理论框架中提出了动词与构式的双向互动观，但在实际论述中却过于强调构式对动词的单向压制，降低了动词义对构式生成的贡献，忽略了对构式组构成分的系统研究。以构式与其组构成分间的互动关系为视点，从构式压制与承继的辩证关系出发，进一步阐释图示构式生成是构式与组构成分在互动压制和多重承继合力作用下的结果。同时，基于封闭语料库穷尽分析汉语羡余否定构式"好不X"的特征，结果表明：构式压制与词汇压制是双向互动的；图示构式特征的形成取决于构式对其组构成分的多重动态承继；图示构式基于互动压制承继合力机制的形成。     

Why do newcomers vote for a newcomer? Support for an immigrant party

This article studies the voters of DENK, the first immigrant party to gain seats in a national parliament. It builds further on the existing literature on how immigrants and people from immigrant descent vote in Western European countries. From the literature we derive seven expectations about the kind of voters that are likely to vote for an immigrant party in terms of their political cynicism, attitudes towards economic, globalisation and moral issues. We find that DENK voters are younger Muslims, who have conservative views on moral matters, cynical attitudes towards politics, right-wing views on economic matters and progressive views on issues that pertain to the globalisation dimension, such as immigration, integration and Islam and in particular discrimination. This article uses VAA data to construct a matched sample that in terms of key variables is representative for voters with and without a migration background.     

论民族生境与民族文化建构

民族学经过一个多世纪的探索，逐步地达成了一个共识，建构一种文化并不是一件轻而易举的事情。文化是指导人类生存发展延续的信息系统，文化的建构是以所处自然生态系统为底本，以并存的社会生态系统为参照，文化这一信息系统不断偏离与回归所处自然生态系统与社会生态系统，在世代延续过程中逐步认知、积累其成败的经验与教训，并在传承的过程中不断地完善和丰富起来。民族以文化为分野，不同民族所处自然环境与社会环境互有差异，这就形成了民族生境的差异性，而民族生境的差异性也同样会建构出不同民族文化事实体系的差异性来。     

谁的乡村建设？——基于乡村建筑变迁的观察和思考

在全面推进乡村振兴的大背景下，乡村建设正如火如荼地开展。其中，乡村建设中农民房屋建筑类型从特质性的“匠心独具”到同质性的“千村一面”，再到异化性的“自厝同异”变迁路径，反映出传统文化的保护危机，也深刻揭示出建筑变迁背后暗藏的农民与地方政府间的多元矛盾和博弈。此问题的根源在于农民主体性被消解，成了被建构的对象或客体，而地方政府却不断强化构建主体的身份认同。事实上，当前乡村建设呈现出五种不同的价值取向：一是为城市消费者休闲情趣的乡村建设；二是为城市中产阶级家乡情感的乡村建设；三是为地方政府凸显政绩的乡村建设；四是为开发商投资回报的乡村建设；五是为农民生存利益的乡村建设。不同参与者均带着不同的利益诉求介入乡村建设，直接影响到乡村建设的发展走向。因此，要处理乡村建设中的矛盾和问题，必须强化农民在乡村建设中的主体意识和主体身份，赋予农民对乡村建设事务的话语权与决定权。     

Participatory shaping of community futures in e‐waste processing hubs: Complexity,conflict and stewarded convergence in a Palestinian context

This article describes an unconventional participatory development approach carried out in an informal e‐waste hub in South‐West Hebron, an area that has collected and processed the bulk of Israeli e‐waste for over a decade. Our approach contributes to the critique and recovery of community representation in participatory development and the search for ways to facilitate representative community engagement. Specifically, we describe our use of a novel Delphi‐like method that allowed us to facilitate a broadly endorsed development trajectory within a heterogeneous and conflicted community. We show how the results yielded by this approach diverged from those that were likely to emerge from more facile forms of participation in ways that are important for other similar e‐waste hubs internationally, which face a destructive status quo on the one hand, or the economically ruinous international policies that ban e‐waste trade from “developed” to “developing” countries on the other. Despite real tensions and cleavages within the affected communities, the process described facilitated a shift from deadlocked environmental versus livelihood positions towards building capacity and regulating existing informal e‐waste trades to preserve livelihoods dependent on these.     

Using Cultivation Theory to Understand American College Students’ Perceptions of Arabs in the Media

Research has shown that Arab portrayals on television have an effect on viewers’ beliefs about Arabs in general. Based on questionnaire responses from 429 undergraduate students, this study sought to examine perceptions of Arabs on television. Results revealed that college students have predominantly antagonistic views about Arabs in general and on television. These findings suggest that television can affect the way college students view reality regarding Arabs and how these perceptions can perpetuate negative stereotypes.     

Introduction: What does the future promise for work,employment and society?

In introducing this double Special Issue, the authors draw on the articles contained therein to highlight the main areas for consideration in research on the future of work. They present the fast‐paced changes affecting the world of work as offering an opportunity to move towards equality‐inducing growth, while warning of the dangers posed by mismanaged technological change, inequalities (highlighting the persistent and intersectional nature of gender inequality), global supply chains and opportunities for social dialogue. In this light, they also propose policy recommendations focusing on strengthening worker protection and representative institutions, rethinking regulatory frameworks and taxation systems, and ensuring just transitions.     

Payment by results in international development: Evidence from the first decade

Payment by results is a relatively new way of giving development aid, where a recipient's performance against pre‐agreed measures determines the amount of aid they receive. Advocates for the mechanism argue it provides donors with both a ready justification for maintaining aid budgets and better results through innovation and autonomy. It has proved popular, with most bilateral aid donors having at least experimented with the mechanism and the variety of measures stretching from individual health workers being paid for each procedure, to national governments being paid for students' test scores. However, there has not been a robust assessment of whether Payment By Results (PbR) achieves its aims for greater effectiveness. I synthesize the evidence from eight projects fully or partially funded by DFID, the recognized world leader on PbR. This represents the best evidence currently available, and is critically analysed using the leading theoretical framework that breaks each agreement into its constituent parts. I find no evidence that PbR leads to fundamentally more innovation or autonomy, with the overall range of success and failure broadly similar to other aid projects. This may partly be due to the current use of Payment by Results, with no readily identifiable examples of projects that truly meet the idealized PbR designs. Advocates of PbR may thus conclude the idea is yet to be tested. I argue PbR does not deal with the fundamental constraints that donors face, and so it is unsurprising that PbR is subject to the normal pressures that affect all aid spending.     

Validation of the Learning Transfer System Inventory (LTSI) in the Korean corporate context

Lack of a valid instrument to measure learning transfer predictors has been the major obstacle hindering Human Resource Development (HRD) professionals from moving forward. This problem is one of the lingering HRD issues in South Korea, in which human resources have been strategically emphasized as a critical asset due to the scarcity of natural resources. To address this issue, this study aims at testing the validity and reliability of the data collected with the Korean Learning Transfer System Inventory (LTSI) Version 4. A sample of 753 managers from 16 Korean industries was divided into two subsamples for exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. Reliability and the effect of common method variance on the factor structure were examined, with the results suggesting that the LTSI is valid for use in the Korean industry.