Adult Attachment Stability–Instability Before and After Marriage Between Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) and Non‐IPV Women Separated from Partners During Military Duty in Indonesia

The quality of attachment between intimate partners is important for women to maintain healthy relationships. Yet, the quality of attachment style and relationship can be marred and disrupted in women exposed to trauma due to intimate partner violence (IPV). Research suggests that the impact of trauma on women can be transmitted over generations due to the inability to regulate emotions, specifically in dealing with their children. The aim of this study was to explore the disruption of adult attachment patterns by comparing a group of women in Indonesia who have been affected by IPV, and a group of women who have not been affected by IPV but who have been separated from their partner during military duty. A cross‐sectional study comparing two groups: women exposed to IPV (n = 35) and women not exposed to IPV (n = 35) was carried out. The adult attachment scale before and after marriage was obtained using Experiences in Close Relationships‐Revised scales. The results revealed a significant shift of attachment style on the Avoidant dimension of the non‐IPV group separated by partner military duty and a slight change on the overall attachment of the IPV group, but relative stability on the Anxiety dimensions. The study interpreted the findings as being more supportive of the prototype perspective rather than the revisionist perspective. Family therapists may reduce the attachment Avoidant dimension as a therapeutic goal of intervention to change the insecure to a more secure working model.     

Estimation of the shape parameter of a Pareto distribution

We consider the problem of estimating the shape parameter of a Pareto distribution with unknown scale under an arbitrary strictly bowl-shaped loss function. Classes of estimators improving upon minimum risk equivariant estimator are derived by adopting Stein, Brown, and Kubokawa techniques. The classes of estimators are shown to include some known procedures such as Stein-type and Brewster and Zidek-type estimators from literature. We also provide risk plots of proposed estimators for illustration purpose.     

Early Word Recognition in Sentence Context: French and English 24‐Month‐Olds' Sensitivity to Sentence‐Medial Mispronunciations and Assimilations

Recent work has shown that young children can use fine phonetic detail during the recognition of isolated and sentence‐final words from early in lexical development. The present study investigates 24‐month‐olds' word recognition in sentence‐medial position in two experiments using an Intermodal Preferential Looking paradigm. In Experiment 1, French toddlers detect word‐final voicing mispronunciations (e.g., bu z [by z ] for bu s [by s ] “bus”), and they compensate for native voicing assimilations (e.g., bu z d evant toi [bu zd ?vɑ?twa] “bus in front of you”) in the middle of sentences. Similarly, English toddlers detect word‐final voicing mispronunciations (e.g., shee b for shee p ) in Experiment 2, but they do not compensate for illicit voicing assimilations (e.g., shee b th ere). Thus, French and English 24‐month‐olds can take into account fine phonetic detail even if words are presented in the middle of sentences, and French toddlers show language‐specific compensation abilities for pronunciation variation caused by native voicing assimilation.     

Maximum Likelihood Estimation of Parameters in a Mixture Model

The estimation of parameters of the log normal distribution based on complete and censored samples are considered in the literature. In this article, the problem of estimating the parameters of log normal mixture model is considered. The Expectation Maximization algorithm is used to obtain maximum likelihood estimators for the parameters, as the likelihood equation does not yield closed form expression. The standard errors of the estimates are obtained. The methodology developed here is then illustrated through simulation studies. The confidence interval based on large-sample theory is obtained.     

Utilizing grassroots workers in family planning programs in India: prospects and problems

In order to rapidly expand the network of delivery systems and speed up the process of acceptance of family planning messages and methods, a shift took place in the Indian family planning program from the bureaucratic "clinical" approach to the people oriented "extension" approach. As a result, there is an increasing emphasis on moving the family planning efforts closer to the grassroots level. A key methodological issue centers on the proper selection, cultural acceptability, and the effectiveness of the grassroots workers who are to be trained and through whom family planning motivational messages and methods are to be introduced. The Indian government, from time to time, has trained and utilized different groups of grassroots workers in its family planning promotional efforts. Anthropological field studies were conducted in two different regions in India to examine the potential and actual roles of two groups of grassroots workers--opinion leaders and traditional birth attendants--in the delivery of family planning services in the rural areas. These studies revealed that while the traditional birth attendants can be trained and utilized to a limited extent in promoting family planning efforts, especially to the eligible female clients, the role of the opinion leaders in such efforts is at best questionable. Based on these field studies, cultural and technical (including bureaucratic) problems in training and utilizing opinion leaders and traditional birth attendants are explored in detail. Modifications in the training program strategies are suggested to improve and expand the family planning delivery system in rural India.     

Reliability analysis of multicomponent stress–strength reliability from a bathtub-shaped distribution

In this paper, inference for a multicomponent stress–strength model is studied. When latent strength and stress random variables follow a bathtub-shaped distribution and the failure times are Type-II censored, the maximum likelihood estimate of the multicomponent stress–strength reliability (MSR) is established when there are common strength and stress parameters. Approximate confidence interval is also constructed by using the asymptotic distribution theory and delta method. Furthermore, another alternative generalized point and confidence interval estimators for the MSR are constructed based on pivotal quantities. Moreover, the likelihood and the pivotal quantities-based estimates for the MSR are also provided under unequal strength and stress parameter case. To compare the equivalence of the stress and strength parameters, the likelihood ratio test for hypothesis of interest is also provided. Finally, simulation studies and a real data example are given for illustration.     

Minimax estimators for the lower-bounded scale parameter of a location-scale family of distributions

This article is concerned with the minimax estimation of a scale parameter under the quadratic loss function where the family of densities is location-scale type. We obtain results for the case when the scale parameter is bounded below by a known constant. Implications for the estimation of a lower-bounded scale parameter of an exponential distribution are presented under unknown location. Furthermore, classes of improved minimax estimators are derived for the restricted parameter using the Integral Expression for Risk Difference (IERD) approach of Kubokawa (1994 Kubokawa, T. (1994). A unified approach to improving equivariant estimators. Ann. Stat. 22:290–299.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). These classes are shown to include some existing estimators from literature.     

Bayesian estimation and prediction based on lognormal record values

In this paper we consider the problems of estimation and prediction when observed data from a lognormal distribution are based on lower record values and lower record values with inter-record times. We compute maximum likelihood estimates and asymptotic confidence intervals for model parameters. We also obtain Bayes estimates and the highest posterior density (HPD) intervals using noninformative and informative priors under square error and LINEX loss functions. Furthermore, for the problem of Bayesian prediction under one-sample and two-sample framework, we obtain predictive estimates and the associated predictive equal-tail and HPD intervals. Finally for illustration purpose a real data set is analyzed and simulation study is conducted to compare the methods of estimation and prediction.     

Fisher information in generalized progressive hybrid-censored data

This article provides a simple expression of the Fisher information matrix about the unknown parameter(s) of the underlying lifetime model under the generalized progressive hybrid censoring scheme. The expressions of the expected number of failures and the expected duration of life test are also derived. Exponential and Weibull lifetime models are considered for numerical illustrations. Finally, Fisher information-based optimal schemes are discussed for the Weibull lifetime model.