A (Semi)Parametric Functional Coefficient Logarithmic Autoregressive Conditional Duration Model

In this article, we propose a class of logarithmic autoregressive conditional duration (ACD)-type models that accommodates overdispersion, intermittent dynamics, multiple regimes, and asymmetries in financial durations. In particular, our functional coefficient logarithmic autoregressive conditional duration (FC-LACD) model relies on a smooth-transition autoregressive specification. The motivation lies on the fact that the latter yields a universal approximation if one lets the number of regimes grows without bound. After establishing sufficient conditions for strict stationarity, we address model identifiability as well as the asymptotic properties of the quasi-maximum likelihood (QML) estimator for the FC-LACD model with a fixed number of regimes. In addition, we also discuss how to consistently estimate a semiparametric variant of the FC-LACD model that takes the number of regimes to infinity. An empirical illustration indicates that our functional coefficient model is flexible enough to model IBM price durations.     

Maternal and Paternal Mental‐state Talk and Executive Function in Preschool Children

The present study examined the relationship between parents’ mental‐state talk and preschoolers’ executive function. Seventy‐two children participated in the present study, as well as their mothers and fathers. When children were enrolled in the second preschool year, mothers’ and fathers’ use of mental‐state references were assessed during a shared picture‐book reading task with the child. Later, four months before admission to the first grade, preschoolers’ executive function was measured. Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that maternal, but not paternal, mental‐state talk was a significant predictor of children's executive function composite, even after accounting for child gender, age, verbal ability, and parental education. When looking at each of the EF components, maternal mental‐state talk proved to be a predictor of set‐shifting whereas no significant relations emerged with inhibitory control or working memory. These findings add to prior research on parenting quality and executive function in preschoolers.     

A Methodology for Assessing the Probability of Occurrence of Undesired Events in the Tietê–Paraná Inland Waterway Based on Expert Opinion

The market share of Tietê–Paraná inland waterway (TPIW) in the transport matrix of the São Paulo state, Brazil, is currently only 0.6%, but it is expected to increase to 6% over the next 20 years. In this scenario, to identify and explore potential undesired events a risk assessment is necessary. Part of this involves assigning the probability of occurrence of events, which usually is accomplished by a frequentist approach. However, in many cases, this approach is not possible due to unavailable or nonrepresentative data. This is the case of the TPIW that even though an expressive accident history is available, a frequentist approach is not suitable due to differences between current operational conditions and those met in the past. Therefore, a subjective assessment is an option as allows for working independently of the historical data, thus delivering more reliable results. In this context, this article proposes a methodology for assessing the probability of occurrence of undesired events based on expert opinion combined with fuzzy analysis. This methodology defines a criterion to weighting the experts and, using the fuzzy logic, evaluates the similarities among the experts’ beliefs to be used in the aggregation process before the defuzzification that quantifies the probability of occurrence of the events based on the experts’ opinion. Moreover, the proposed methodology is applied to the real case of the TPIW and the results obtained from the elicited experts are compared with a frequentist approach evidencing the impact on the results when considering different interpretations of the probability.     

消解STS中的坚冰——马塞洛·费茨对话哈里·柯林斯

本次访谈中,哈里·柯林斯和马塞洛·费茨讨论了柯林斯早期关于默会知识在实验室研究中的重要性,早期科学技术研究(STS)的革命精神以及他对当前这一主题智识关注度下降的担忧,他认为这是由于行动者网络理论(ANT)方法的普及以及对与政策相关的STS研究的日益重视.柯林斯描述了在STS的早期,他是如何成为社会科学家中的一员及这些社会科学家对科学知识和实践的分析感兴趣,他们沉浸在其中并发展研究这个新主题的激进方法.对他来说,在这种相互交汇中互动型专长的发展是一个关键的研究工具——也是在STS领域产生一种令人信服的理解科学和技术的新方法最有效的方式.在他的后续反思中,费茨考虑了消解科学坚冰所需的统一条件,以及STS制度化带来的后期问题.     

Parental Expertise,Trustworthiness, and Accessibility: Parent‐Adolescent Communication and Adolescent Risk Behavior

A communication framework of persuasion and attitude change was utilized to analyze parent‐adolescent communication about adolescent risk behavior. Three parent dimensions were deemed important: (a) perceived expertise, (b) perceived trustworthiness, and (c) perceived accessibility. Data were collected in surveys from 668 mother‐adolescent dyads in economically disadvantaged neighborhoods in New York City (N= 668). Results showed weak correspondence between how expert, trustworthy, and accessible mothers thought they were on the one hand and how their sons and daughters characterized them on the other. All dimensions were related to how often adolescents said they talked with their mothers about a risk behavior, which, in turn, was predictive of lower levels of adolescent risk behavior. Implications for future research are discussed.     

Youth Civic Engagement in the Twenty‐First Century

We enter the 21st century contending with the end of the Cold War's legacy of political uncertainty, expecting youth to play a significant part in the search for new principles that will bring about stability in the world political order. In forging the future, youth will have to collaborate with adults, but on terms more fitting of the historical circumstances that lie ahead than those of the past. This was the framework adopted by a group of social scientists who held several discussions to reflect on the issues and opportunities that bear on youth's civic engagement and development in the century that has just opened. The present article describes the results of those conversations, starting with the issue of defining civic competence, and the finding that an expansive definition is needed to match the real‐world circumstances that affect its development for youth internationally. Specific conditions, such as globalization, information – communication technology, and immigration, are emphasized as forces that affect youth and need to be taken into account by educators and policy makers. In this regard, responsibilities of schools, government, the commercial sector, and community organizations are outlined. Each is viewed as a potential constructive force for promoting engagement insofar as youth's strengths are recognized and focus is placed on building on youth's proven capacities. As always, it is youth’s task to make history in the future and society's obligation to provide youth with sufficient resources and an honest basis for hope in carrying out this task. The authors' policy recommendations are founded on this reciprocal relation that binds the youth generation with its elders in the common task of preserving, while transforming, society for the good of humanity.     

Race differentials in employment effects of psychological distress: A study of non-Hispanic Whites and African-Americans in the United States

This study used two sub-samples of African-Americans and non-Hispanic Whites from the 2002–2003 U.S. National Survey on Drug Use and Health to examine differential effects of psychological distress (PD) on employment. Failing to reject exogeneity of PD in the employment specifications, we estimated standard probit of employment. We found that PD significantly reduced employment probability regardless of race; but the reduction was 7.4% for African-Americans, compared to 5.3% for Whites. Using individuals with PD only, we estimated the Oaxaca–Blinder decomposition and found endowments explained 61% of employment differences between Whites with PDs and African-Americans with PDs while 39% of these differences were due to unexplained factors. These findings suggest that targeted policies for prevention and effective treatment of PD might yield higher employment benefits for minorities.     

The Hemispheric Social Alliance and the Free Trade Area of the Americas Process: The Challenges and Opportunities of Transnational Coalitions against Neo-liberalism

The paper analyses the formation of a transnational coalition of civil society organizations coordinated by the Hemispheric Social Alliance to oppose the establishment of a Free Trade Area of the Americas. Representing labour unions, social movements, indigenous, environmental and citizen organizations from throughout the Americas, the HSA has served as the mediator between multiple expressions of resistance to neo-liberalism rooted in local/national processes, and a wider strategy at the hemispheric level to pursue a sustainable and democratic form of development alternative to the FTAA project. Drawing on a political process approach from the sociology of social movements, the paper explores the challenges and opportunities of the HSA to construct political alternatives to the neo-liberal agenda of the FTAA project. The central argument is that while significant progress was achieved by the HSA in defining a hemispheric basis of consensus for an alternative political agenda, there remains the challenge of ensuring that the process of constructing such alternatives is democratic and inclusive of the grassroots sectors. On the one hand, there must be a balance between the need to increase the HSA's capacity to mobilize critical social forces from the continent in a campaign against the FTAA and, on the other hand, to ensure the cohesion of an expanding coalition increasingly under strain by the alignment of new sectors and actors.

El documento analiza la formación de una coalición transnacional de organizaciones de sociedades civiles coordinadas por la Alianza Social Hemisférica para oponerse al establecimiento de un área de libre comercio entre las Américas. La Alianza Social Hemisférica, representando sindicatos laborales, movimientos sociales, indígenas, organizaciones del medio ambiente y civiles a lo largo de las Américas, ha servido como mediadora entre múltiples expresiones de resistencia a procesos neoliberales con raíces locales/nacionales y una estrategia más amplia a nivel hemisférico, para lograr una forma sostenible y democrática de alternativa de desarrollo al proyecto de un Área de Libre Comercio entre las Américas (FTAA, por sus siglas en inglés). El documento explora los retos y oportunidades de la Alianza Social Hemisférica (HSA, por sus siglas en inglés) trazando un método del proceso político de la sociología de movimientos sociales, para construir alternativas políticas al plan del proyecto del FTAA. El argumento central es que mientras se logró un progreso significativo mediante la HSA al definir una base de consenso hemisférico para un plan político alternativo, permanece el reto de asegurar que el proceso de elaborar tales alternativas sea democrático e incluya a la base y a los sectores populares. Por un lado, debe haber un equilibrio entre la necesidad de la capacidad de ampliar la Alianza Social Hemisférica (HSA, por sus siglas en inglés), para movilizar a las fuerzas sociales críticas del continente en una campaña contra el FTAA y, por el otro lado, para asegurar la cohesión de una coalición que se amplía cada vez más bajo la tensión por la alineación de nuevos sectores y actores.

Knowledge, if it does not determine action, is dead to us. (Plotinus, 204–270 AD)