The Satisfaction with Sex Life Across the Adult Life Span

Three separate issues concerning the relation between age and satisfaction with sex life are addressed in this article. The first issue was concerned with the age generalizability of the factor structure produced by responses to the Satisfaction with Sex Life Scale (SWSLS). The second issue was to examine whether there were differences in the satisfaction with sex life according to certain background characteristics, namely age. Finally, the relationship between scores on the SWSLS with those on other relational constructs was explored. Data collection involved completion of a questionnaire. The sample consisted of 1,144 participants. The mean ages of the sample were 38.99 years in (SD = 16.91); ages ranged from 20 to 80. The data indicated that the factor structure of responses to the SWSLS were highly similar through adult life. Religious involvement, marital status, and love status influenced satisfaction with sex life. Expected correlations with measures of other relationship constructs were found. The strongest predictor of satisfaction with sex live across the adult life span was love satisfaction. Suggestions concerning the use of the SWSLS for research and clinical purposes are offered.     

Profiles identification on hierarchical tree structure data sets

In this work we study a way to explore and extract more information from data sets with a hierarchical tree structure. We propose that any statistical study on this type of data should be made by group, after clustering. In this sense, the most adequate approach is to use the Mahalanobis–Wasserstein distance as a measure of similarity between the cases, to carry out clustering or unsupervised classification. This methodology allows for the clustering of cases, as well as the identification of their profiles, based on the distribution of all the variables that characterises each subject associated with each case. An application to a set of teenagers' interviews regarding their habits of communication is described. The interviewees answered several questions about the kind of contacts they had on their phone, Facebook, email or messenger as well as the frequency of communication between them. The results indicate that the methodology is adequate to cluster this kind of data sets, since it allows us to identify and characterise different profiles from the data. We compare the results obtained with this methodology with the ones obtained using the entire database, and we conclude that they may lead to different findings.     

Designing a Faculty Development Program on Technology

This article illustrates the challenges of creating a faculty development program on technology through the presentation of experiences with one such program, the Virtual Guild. Using examples from the Virtual Guild, the authors focus on the areas of program design and faculty motivation. The discussion of program design involves selecting content and determining the program format. Motivational issues discussed include individual- and organizational-level factors, as well as the combined effect of these factors on faculty participation.     

Wage differentials within a female‐dominated occupation: Domestic workers in informal and flexible jobs in Portugal

The authors use an original cross‐sectional data set to examine the impact of informal and flexible contractual arrangements on the wages of domestic workers hired by private employers in Portugal. OLS estimations suggest that formality benefits workers, whether they have a stable or a flexible contract. However, social and labour market processes help to shape and maintain inequality, especially for migrant workers. Although skills are undervalued and do not generate rewards, higher wages are identified for workers who are engaged in contingent work, work for multiple employers or provide care for the elderly. However, such workers are still subject to exploitation and insecurity.     

Zero-modified power series distribution and its Hurdle distribution version

This paper presents a new family of distributions for count data, the so called zero-modified power series (ZMPS), which is an extension of the power series (PS) distribution family, whose support starts at zero. This extension consists in modifying the probability of observing zero of each PS distribution, enabling the new zero-modified distribution to appropriately accommodate data which have any amount of zero observations (for instance, zero-inflated or zero-deflated data). The Hurdle distribution version of the ZMPS distribution is presented. PS distributions included in the proposed ZMPS family are the Poisson, Generalized Poisson, Geometric, Binomial, Negative Binomial and Generalized Negative Binomial distributions. The paper also describes the properties and particularities of the new distribution family for count data. The distribution parameters are estimated via maximum likelihood method and the use of the new family is illustrated in three real data sets. We emphasize that the new distribution family can accommodate sets of count data without any previous knowledge on the characteristic of zero-inflation or zero-deflation present in the data.     

Intermediary objects in the workspace design process: means of experience transfer in the offshore sector

The aim of this paper is to discuss the use of intermediary objects in the workspace design process of offshore accommodations module. The integration of ergonomics in the design process can lead to better work conditions, more effectiveness in the work process and less health and safety issues. Moreover, it is more efficient in terms of cost if ergonomics is considered from the initial phases of the project, as the potential costs of the redesign, the possible losses and the down-time in the operation of the platform would be more increased. The goal, then, is to discuss the integration of ergonomics and users involvement in the design process of accommodations modules, focusing on the transfer of information from reference situations by the use of intermediary objects during the process. In this paper we will present two tools developed to be used as intermediary object(s) aiming at transferring the experience from the use to the design in the specific field of offshore accommodations module.     

Les écarts salariaux dans une profession à prédominance féminine: le travail domestique informel et flexible au Portugal

Les auteures étudient les effets des arrangements informels et flexibles sur les salaires des travailleurs domestiques employés par des personnes privées au Portugal. Les estimations indiquent que l'emploi formel est bénéfque aux travailleurs, que leur contrat soit stable ou fexible. Toutefois, les mécanismes du marché du travail et des fonctionnements sociaux favorisent la persistance des inégalités, surtout au détriment des travailleurs migrants. Les qualifcations ne sont ni valorisées ni rétribuées, et on observe des salaires supérieurs chez les travailleurs occasionnels et ceux qui ont plusieurs employeurs ou s'occupent de personnes âgées. Cependant, ces travailleurs restent exposés à l'exploitation et à l'insécurité.     

A practical method to calculate probabilities: illustrative example from the electronic industry business

The real-life environment is made of probabilistic data by nature and the ability to make decisions based on probabilities is crucial in the business world. It is common to have a set of data and the need of calculating the probability of taking a value greater or less than a specific value. It is also common in many companies the unavailability of a statistical software or a specialized professional in statistics. The purpose of this paper is to present a practical and simple method to calculate probabilities from normal or non-normal distributed data set and illustrate it with an application from the electronic industry. The method does not demand statistical knowledge from the user; there is no need of normality assumptions, goodness test or transformations. The proposed method is easy to implement, robust and the experiments have evidenced its quality. The technique is validated with a large variety of instances and compared with the well-known Johnson system of distributions.     

A demand classification scheme for spare part inventory model subject to stochastic demand and lead time

In this study, we aim to develop a demand classification methodology for classifying and controlling inventory spare parts subject to stochastic demand and lead time. Using real data, the developed models were tested and their performances were evaluated and compared. The results show that the Laplace model provided superior performance in terms of service level, fill rate (FR) and inventory cost. Compared with the current system based on normal distribution, the proposed Laplace model yielded significant savings and good results in terms of the service level and the FR. The Laplace and Gamma optimisation models resulted in savings of 82 and 81%, respectively.     

Quality of diet of working college students

Considering the scarcity of studies with young workers and the role of diet in the prevention of chronic diseases, the objective of the study was to assess the quality of diet of working college students. The present study investigated 43 university students, aged between 18 and 25 years old who had systematically being involved in a working activity in the past 6 months, paid or unpaid, at least 6 hours daily, five days a week. Dietary intake measured by seven dietary records covering every day of the week was used to calculate the Brazilian Healthy Eating Index Revised (B-HEIR). It was observed a low B-HEIR score (53.43,±7.81) indicating a risk of a poor quality of diet, with high intake of sodium and sugar and low consumption of fruits and whole grains. This poor quality of diet can result in an inadequate nutritional status that may increase the risk of obesity and chronic diseases.