Statistical Methods and Graphical Displays for Analyzing How the Association Between Two Qualitative Variables Differs Among Countries, Among Groups, Or Over Time: A Modified Regression-Type Approach

Many interesting sociological questions pertain to how the association between two variables depends on a third variable. In sociological applications, the third variable often pertains to countries, to subgroups of a population, or to time periods. We propose a regression-type approach that specifies that the log-odds- ratios that describe the two-way association of interest are a linear function of latent scores for the third variable. Additive and multiplicative models currently in use by researchers are special cases of the regression-type model. To illustrate the utility of the regression-type approach, we apply this approach to analyze (1) data on occupational mobility in the United States, Britain, and Japan (comparing mobility in these countries) and (2) data on the association between religion and voting behavior in U.S. presidential elections from 1968 to 1992 (comparing this association in the different elections). We also introduce here graphical displays that can be used to obtain worthwhile information about goodness-of-fit and to aid in substantive interpretation.     

Media Technologies, Images of Drugs, and an Evocative Telepresence

I regard electronic media technologies as framing devices for how viewers perceive issues associated with illegal drugs. Controllers of electronic media technologies produce and disseminate images of illegal drugs and users of such drugs to which viewers respond. People who control the images of electronic media production create an evocative telepresence, or a visual context that relies on appeals to authority and emotion. However, viewers do not merely respond to images of illegal drugs; rather, they actively interpret such images and draw their own conclusions. To demonstrate the complex relationship between electronic stimuli and viewer responses, I report on a classroom experiment comparing those who saw and heard a heroin user with those who only heard this user. I also report findings from student perceptions of and reactions to four drug films. Results of the experiment and the readings of films indicate that viewers, especially those who can see and hear electronic displays, are sophisticated consumers who respond to immediate stimuli while making reference to distal stimuli. In the main, I contend that electronic images of illegal drugs and users in an evocative telepresence are powerful stimuli, but they do not cause viewer perceptions.     

Long-term marriages: A critical review

Research guidelines are proposed for the study of long-term marriages based on a critical review of existing studies. Current problems in the collection and analysis of the data include the lack of agreement about the minimum length of a long-term relationship, the failure to make couple comparisons, or to follow samples longitudinally. In addition, the response rate is uniformly low and the variables studied are not consistent. Future research should gather data about couples, not just individuals, and should utilize standardized measures. It is important to begin to build a comprehensive and comparable data base of long-term marital relationships.     

Blacks, whites, and attitudes towards abortion

This article examines patterns of black and white support forabortion from 1972 to 1980. The findings reveal that black-whitedifferences are present on the abortion issue. Many of the differencesare due to the different demographic characteristics of blacksand whites and the greater degree of religiosity of blacks.     

Social and Economic Motivation at Work

Public Organization Review -     

Managing from the Inside Out: Drawing on 'Receptivity' to Explain Variation in Strategy Implementation

With the rise of 'New Public Management' (NPM), government policy has encouraged public-sector organizations to downsize and outsource their services. There is, however, local variation in the use of outsourcing – this is 'managing from the inside out'. This paper draws on the notion of receptivity for organizational change to explain variation in strategy implementation. Four receptivity factors are identified which seem to explain the success of two contrasting English local government outsourcing strategies: ideological vision, leading change, institutional politics and implementation capacity. The organization level of change is interconnected with two other levels of change (the public service and environment levels) to illustrate the dynamic nature of change.     

Variable precision rough set theory and data discretisation: an application to corporate failure prediction

Since the seminal work of Pawlak (International Journal of Information and Computer Science, 11 (1982) 341–356) rough set theory (RST) has evolved into a rule-based decision-making technique. To date, however, relatively little empirical research has been conducted on the efficacy of the rough set approach in the context of business and finance applications. This paper extends previous research by employing a development of RST, namely the variable precision rough sets (VPRS) model, in an experiment to predict between failed and non-failed UK companies. It also utilizes the FUSINTER discretisation method which neglates the influence of an ‘expert’ opinion. The results of the VPRS analysis are compared to those generated by the classical logit and multivariate discriminant analysis, together with more closely related non-parametric decision tree methods. It is concluded that VPRS is a promising addition to existing methods in that it is a practical tool, which generates explicit probabilistic rules from a given information system, with the rules offering the decision maker informative insights into classification problems.     

Produktdesign und Semi-Statische Absicherung von Turbo-Zertifikaten

Zusammenfassung  Turbo-Zertifikate geh?ren derzeit zu den beliebtesten strukturierten Produkten für Privatanleger. Sie lassen sich als Spezialformen von Barrier-Optionen auffassen. In Bezug auf das Produktdesign ist das Verh?ltnis von Kursschranke und Basispreis von Bedeutung. Unter Ausnutzung der Put-Call-Symmetrie wird gezeigt, dass eine geeignete Wahl der Ausstattungsmerkmale dem Emittenten eine semi-statische überabsicherung in Standard-Optionen erm?glicht, die bezüglich einer ganzen Modellklasse gültig ist. Im Gegensatz zu der in der Praxis g?ngigen Preisstellung kann eine Absicherung der Zahlungsverpflichtungen im Allgemeinen nicht unabh?ngig von der Volatilit?t erfolgen.

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Product design and semi-static hedging of turbo-certificates

Summary  Turbo-Certificates are one of the most popular structured equity products for private investors in Germany. They can be regarded as special forms of barrier options. For the design of these products, the relation between the barrier level and the strike price is especially important. By using the put-call-symmetry, we show that by a certain choice of these parameters, the issuer is able to obtain an almost static (super-) hedge in standard option contracts which is valid for a general class of models. It turns out that in contrast to the pricing rule which is often used in practice, the issuer can neither hedge a single certificate nor a portfolio of certificates independent of the volatility.

     

The increase in marital status differences in mortality up to the oldest age in seven European countries, 1990-99

We investigate mortality differentials by marital status among older age groups using a database of mortality rates by marital status at ages 40 and over for seven European countries with 1 billion person-years of exposure. The mortality advantage of married people, both men and women, continues to increase up to at least the age group 85-89, the oldest group we are able to consider. We find the largest absolute differences in mortality levels between marital status groups are at high ages, and that absolute differentials are: (i) greater for men than for women; (ii) similar in magnitude across countries; (iii) increase steadily with age; and (iv) are greatest at older age. We also find that the advantage enjoyed by married people increased over the 1990s in almost all cases. We note that results for groups such as older divorced women need to be interpreted with caution.