Teenage parent programs. A synthesis of the long-term effects of the New Chance Demonstration, Ohio's Learning, Earning, and Parenting Program, and the Teenage Parent Demonstration.

This article synthesizes the long-term findings from three major evaluations of programs that began in the late 1980s and were designed to improve the self-sufficiency of teenage mothers on welfare. Although each of the programs emphasized a different approach, an important story emerges. Economic outcomes for the mothers improved over time, and the interventions had some positive effects, particularly for the women who began these programs while they were enrolled is school. However, the interventions did not affect fertility, and the data on outcomes for the mothers' children raise concern.     

The effect of aggregation on nonlinearity

This paper investigates the interaction between aggregation and nonlinearity through a monte carlo study. Various tests for neglected nonlinearity are used to compare the power of the tests for different nonlinear models to different levels of aggregation. Three types of aggregation, namely, cross-sectional aggregation, temporal aggregation and systematic sampling are considered. Aggregation is inclined to simplify nonlinearity. The degree to which nonlinearity is reduced depends on the importance of common factor and extent of the aggregation. The effect is larger when the size of common factor is smaller and when the extent of the aggregation is larger.     

Testosterone,marital quality,and role overload

In a sample of established working‐ and middle‐class families with school‐aged children (N= 307 wives and 307 husbands), neither husbands’ nor wives’ testosterone showed a direct connection with marital quality. In contrast, the association between husbands’ testosterone and positive and negative marital quality (as evaluated by both spouses) was conditional on husbands’ role overload. When perceptions of role overload were elevated, higher testosterone levels were associated with lower levels of marital quality. When perceptions of role overload were low, higher testosterone was linked to greater marital quality. The study supports the biosocial model such that, depending on perceptions of the social context, testosterone enables positive behavior in some instances and negative behavior in others.     

Forecasting Performance of Information Criteria with Many Macro Series

Stock & Watson (1999) consider the relative quality of different univariate forecasting techniques. This paper extends their study on forecasting practice, comparing the forecasting performance of two popular model selection procedures, the Akaike information criterion (AIC) and the Bayesian information criterion (BIC). This paper considers several topics: how AIC and BIC choose lags in autoregressive models on actual series, how models so selected forecast relative to an AR(4) model, the effect of using a maximum lag on model selection, and the forecasting performance of combining AR(4), AIC, and BIC models with an equal weight.     

African American Adults' Perceptions of the Effects of Parental Loss During Adolescence

The purpose of this study was to examine twenty African American adults' perceptions of the effects of parental loss during their adolescence, examine their grief reactions at the time, and identify how they were assisted through the grieving process. The study results indicated that males experienced significantly more delinquent behavior than females following the loss of the parent. Respondents who had grief reactions for more than a year experienced multiple problem and behavioral reactions. The study found that most participants did not receive professional help but relied on informal help for their grief. Implications of the results are discussed.     

The effect of aggregation on nonlinearity

This paper investigates the interaction between aggregation and nonlinearity through a monte carlo study. Various tests for neglected nonlinearity are used to compare the power of the tests for different nonlinear models to different levels of aggregation. Three types of aggregation, namely, cross-sectional aggregation, temporal aggregation and systematic sampling are considered. Aggregation is inclined to simplify nonlinearity. The degree to which nonlinearity is reduced depends on the importance of common factor and extent of the aggregation. The effect is larger when the size of common factor is smaller and when the extent of the aggregation is larger.     

Critical phenomena in complex contagions

Why do some contagions “go viral” and others do not? Research on “small world” networks (Watts and Strogatz, 1998) shows how a very small number of long-range ties that bridge between clusters can allow contagions to spread almost as rapidly as on a random network of equal density. Recent research shows how long-range ties that accelerate the spread of information and disease can impede the spread of complex contagions—behaviors, beliefs and preferences that diffuse via contact with multiple adopters ( Centola and Macy, 2007). In confirming this result analytically and extending the analysis from small world to power law networks, we discovered that complex contagions require a critical mass of infected nodes that corresponds to a phase transition in the ability of the contagion to take advantage of the “shortcuts” created by long-range ties. We demonstrate how this critical mass is related to the dynamics of the contagion process and identify implications for modeling behaviors that spread via social influence, such as viral marketing and social movements.     

Perception of Risks From Electromagnetic Fields: A Psychometric Evaluation of a Risk-Communication Approach

Potential health risks from exposure to power-frequency electromagnetic fields (EMF) have become an issue of significant public concern. This study evaluates a brochure designed to communicate EMF health risks from a scientific perspective. The study utilized a pretest-posttest design in which respondents judged various sources of EMF (and other) health and safety risks, both before reading the brochure and after. Respondents assessed risks on dimensions similar to those utilized in previous studies of risk perception. In addition, detailed ratings were made that probed respondents' beliefs about the possible causal effects of EMF exposure. The findings suggest that naive beliefs about the potential of EMF exposure to cause harm were highly influenced by specific content elements of the brochure. The implications for using risk-communication approaches based on communicating scientific uncertainty are discussed.