Can one TV show make a difference? Will & Grace and the Parasocial Contact Hypothesis

Television has an opportunity to influence beliefs about groups with which individuals typically may have little direct social contact. This study describes a synthesis of the Contact Hypothesis and the concept of Parasocial Interaction to pose what we call the Parasocial Contact Hypothesis to test whether exposure to gay men on Will & Grace can influence attitudes toward gay men in general. Based on a study of 245 university students, this study examines the relationships among number and intimacy of gay social contacts, parasocial interaction, viewing frequency of Will & Grace, and scores on Herek's Attitudes Toward Gay Men and Lesbians scale. Increased viewing frequency and parasocial interaction were found to correlate with lower levels of sexual prejudice-a relationship that was most pronounced for those with the least amount of social contact with lesbians and gay men.     

24/7 SM slavery

This study describes the nature of 24/7 SM slavery as practiced within the SM (sadomasochistic) community. These SM participants, who attempt to live full-time in owner-slave roles, represent a small proportion of those with SM interests. SM slaves have not been studied systematically to determine if and how they differ from other SM practitioners. An online questionnaire was used to obtain responses from individuals who self-identified as slaves. A total of 146 respondents participated, 53% female and 47% male, ranging in age from 18 to 72. We explored the depth of their relationships, how well they approximated "slavery," and how their relationships were structured to maintain distinct roles. Data showed that in long-term SM slave relationships, a power differential exists which extends beyond time-limited SM or sexual interactions. Owners and slaves often use common, daily life experiences or situations, such as the completion of household chores, money management, and morning or evening routines, to distinguish and maintain their respective roles. In addition, contrary to the perception of total submission, results revealed that slaves exercise free will when it is in their best interests to do so. These relationships were long-lasting and satisfying to the respondents.     

EVALUATING ECONOMICS RESEARCH IN EUROPE: AN INTRODUCTION

This paper introduces a symposium of EEA‐funded studies that evaluate economics research in Europe. The paper considers some general issues in evaluations, paying special attention to the problem of selecting journal weights, and notes some special features of the individual studies. Despite their very different approaches, the same group of institutions tend to appear at the top of all lists, though individual ranks are sensitive to the choice of more or less elitist journal weights. All the studies show that the gap between economics research in Europe and the United States is narrowing, but remains very wide. (JEL: A10, J44)     

A Bayesian piecewise exponential phase II design for monitoring a time-to-event endpoint

A robust Bayesian design is presented for a single-arm phase II trial with an early stopping rule to monitor a time to event endpoint. The assumed model is a piecewise exponential distribution with non-informative gamma priors on the hazard parameters in subintervals of a fixed follow up interval. As an additional comparator, we also define and evaluate a version of the design based on an assumed Weibull distribution. Except for the assumed models, the piecewise exponential and Weibull model based designs are identical to an established design that assumes an exponential event time distribution with an inverse gamma prior on the mean event time. The three designs are compared by simulation under several log-logistic and Weibull distributions having different shape parameters, and for different monitoring schedules. The simulations show that, compared to the exponential inverse gamma model based design, the piecewise exponential design has substantially better performance, with much higher probabilities of correctly stopping the trial early, and shorter and less variable trial duration, when the assumed median event time is unacceptably low. Compared to the Weibull model based design, the piecewise exponential design does a much better job of maintaining small incorrect stopping probabilities in cases where the true median survival time is desirably large.     

The Theory of Global Games on Test: Experimental Analysis of Coordination Games with Public and Private Information

The theory of global games has shown that coordination games with multiple equilibria may have a unique equilibrium if certain parameters of the payoff function are private information instead of common knowledge. We report the results of an experiment designed to test the predictions of this theory. Comparing sessions with common and private information, we observe only small differences in behavior. For common information, subjects coordinate on threshold strategies that deviate from the global game solution towards the payoff‐dominant equilibrium. For private information, thresholds are closer to the global game solution than for common information. Variations in the payoff function affect behavior as predicted by comparative statics of the global game solution. Predictability of coordination points is about the same for both information conditions.     

Empowering manufacturing personnel through functional understanding

A growing interest in knowledge management and standardisation, has increasingly led organisations to implement employee training programs. For the manufacturing workforce, however, these remain limited to informal ‘On-the-Job’ approaches, administered by peer colleagues – particularly in Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) where economic, educational, cognitive and cultural constraints are often deeply embedded. This paper proposes a methodology for training the manufacturing workforce on the functions of products, and presents a case study conducted in a UK-based manufacturing SME – aiming to verify our two research hypotheses: a) Functional Analysis Diagrams of the company’s products and parts would assist in knowledge assimilation; and, b) knowledge assimilation has a positive effect on work quality and productivity levels. By applying statistical inference methods on long-term quantitative data and survey results, we confirmed substantial improvements in work quality (63%) and increased productivity (67%), supporting our hypotheses and suggesting that the proposed methodology can be a promising solution for the industry.     

More Than a Feeling? An Empirical Analysis of the Dual-Continua Model on a National Sample of Lesbian,Gay, and Bisexual Identified Canadians

The goal of the study is to investigate whether positive mental health complements mental illness within a theoretically informed (the dual-continua model) and psychometrically tested (the Mental Health Continuum-Short Form) framework. National-level, population-based data from the 2012 Canadian Community Health Survey on Mental Health (CCHS-MH) was used, with comparisons between sexual minority and heterosexual adults. Results show that gay, lesbian, and bisexual Canadians have substantially lower rates of positive mental health and are more likely to have been diagnosed with a mental illness, with the disparities between health and illness being the most pronounced among lesbians and bisexual females. Results show considerable support for the dual-continua model, which posits that the absence of health does not automatically translate into the presence of illness, and vice versa. Suggestions are made for practitioners and researchers toward the use of the dual-continua model as a surveillance tool, especially among sexual minority individuals.     

Australian migration propensities by visa class: an analysis of linked administrative data

Journal of Population Research - Following a number of difficulties measuring net overseas migration (NOM), since 2006 the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has defined a usual resident of...