Household Economic Behavior in Post‐Socialist Rural Hungary*

Abstract This paper investigates the organization of household economic behavior in post‐socialist rural Hungary. Data from 751 randomly selected households in three rural regions of the country showed weak labor force attachment and heavy reliance on social welfare programs among these households. Self‐provisioning and interhousehold exchange were also prevalent. The data showed that interhousehold exchange is motivated by both economic and social logics. Interhousehold exchange appears to be more likely among better‐off households with more economic and social resources.     

Demographic Characteristics and Contraceptive Practices of Abortion Patients at a New Zealand Medical Centre

A highly controversial Centre performing early pregnancy terminations opened in Auckland in May 1974, and remained the only facility specialising in abortion in New Zealand. It closed following the enactment of the Crimes Amendment Act in December 1977. Analysis of social characteristics of attenders shows that this Centre served a younger population than those having abortions in public hospitals. Fewer than 47% of those obtaining abortions had previously used a contraceptive technique, and of those who did the majority used methods with relatively high failure rates. There was a relationship between educational attainment, age, and contraceptive usage.     

Government Organization and Power

We develop a theoretical framework to examine how government organization affects its power and size. The framework abstracts from distortions that arise from the means of government finance and separates government power into two dimensions—pure coercive power and pure pricing power. A government can exert its coercive power to shift the demand for its services outward and grow too large. It can simultaneously exert its pricing power to restrict output along a given demand curve to earn rents. Consequently, neither size nor rents alone are reliable indicators of the extent to which government provision of services is nonoptimal.     

Kruskal–Wallis, Multiple Comparisons and Efron Dice

The Kruskal–Wallis test is a rank–based one way ANOVA. Its test statistic is shown here to be a quadratic form among the Mann–Whitney or Kendall tau concordance measures between pairs of treatments. But the full set of such concordance measures has more degrees of freedom than the Kruskal–Wallis test uses, and the independent surplus is attributable to circularity, or non–transitive effects. The meaning of circularity is well illustrated by Efron dice. The cases of k = 3, 4 treatments are analysed thoroughly in this paper, which also shows how the full sum of squares among all concordance measures can be decomposed into uncorrelated transitive and non–transitive circularity effects. A multiple comparisons procedure based on patterns of transitive orderings among treatments is implemented. The testing of circularities involves non–standard asymptotic distributions. The asymptotic theory is deferred, but Monte Carlo permutation tests are easy to implement.     

Applying a Health Behavior Theory to Explore the Influence of Information and Experience on Arsenic Risk Representations, Policy Beliefs, and Protective Behavior

The common sense model (CSM) shows how people process information to construct representations, or mental models, that guide responses to health threats. We applied the CSM to understand how people responded to information about arsenic-contaminated well water. Constructs included external information (arsenic level and information use), experience (perceived water quality and arsenic-related health effects), representations, safety judgments, opinions about policies to mitigate environmental arsenic, and protective behavior. Of 649 surveys mailed to private well users with arsenic levels exceeding the maximum contaminant level, 545 (84%) were analyzed. Structural equation modeling quantified CSM relationships. Both external information and experience had substantial effects on behavior. Participants who identified a water problem were more likely to reduce exposure to arsenic. However, about 60% perceived good water quality and 60% safe water. Participants with higher arsenic levels selected higher personal safety thresholds and 20% reported a lower arsenic level than indicated by their well test. These beliefs would support judgments of safe water. A variety of psychological and contextual factors may explain judgments of safe water when information suggested otherwise. Information use had an indirect effect on policy beliefs through understanding environmental causes of arsenic. People need concrete information about environmental risk at both personal and environmental-systems levels to promote a comprehensive understanding and response. The CSM explained responses to arsenic information and may have application to other environmental risks.     

Turning sexual science into news: sex research and the media.

In this article we report on the findings of a two-part project investigating contemporary issues in sexuality researchers' interaction with journalists. The goal of the project was to explore best practices and suggest curricular and training initiatives for sexuality researchers and journalists that would enhance the accurate dissemination of sexuality research results in the media. We present the results of a survey of a convenience sample of 94 sexuality researchers about their experiences and concerns regarding media coverage and a summary of the main themes that emerged from an invitational conference of sexuality researchers and journalists. In addition, we present some preliminary recommendations for training and best practices. Topics assessed include reporting accuracy; sex researchers' comfort with various topics, media, and journalists; researchers' perceptions of the purpose and content of articles; concern about the impact of media coverage; and training for sexuality researchers.     

Comparison at 32–37 Weeks Postconception of Infants Born 1983–1989 and 1995–2004 on the Neurobehavioral Assessment of the Preterm Infant

In spite of numerous recent outcome studies of extremely low birth weight (ELBW) infants, no data exist on their development prior to term. In this study we traced and compared the neurobehavioral development of 251 ELBW (< 1,000 g) and 240 low birth weight (LBW; 1,000 g–2,500 g) preterms born between 1995 and 2004 from 32 to 37 weeks postconceptional age (PCA), using the Neurobehavioral Assessment of the Preterm Infant (NAPI Korner & Thom, 1990). Compared to the original NAPI cohort of 521 infants (born 1983–1989), the ELBW and LBW infants were at higher medical risk, displayed weaker motor development, a tighter scarf sign and popliteal angle at all or most PCAs, and a weaker cry at older PCAs; they did not differ in irritability and percent asleep ratings. Few differences were noted between the ELBW and LBW groups. Research is now needed to determine whether the 1995 to 2004 NAPI values of ELBW and LBW infants at 32 to 37 weeks PCA are predictive of later outcome of high‐risk preterms.     

Improving Functioning of the Remarried Family System

This report presents salient issues for therapists in understanding and treating the remarried (Rem, second, blended, reconstituted or step) family. The structure of the remarried family is differentiated from that of the intact family. Specific treatment goals for Rem families are elaborated and various treatment modalities advocated. The need to include former spouses and to consider the meta family system are discussed. Common reactions and difficulties engendered in therapists when working with Rem systems are explicated.     

A comparison of univariate and multivariate multilevel models for repeated measures of use of antenatal care in Uttar Pradesh

Summary.  We compare two different multilevel modelling approaches to the analysis of repeated measures data to assess the effect of mother level characteristics on women's use of prenatal care services in Uttar Pradesh, India. We apply univariate multilevel models to our data and find that the model assumptions are severely violated and the parameter estimates are not stable, particularly for the mother level random effect. To overcome this we apply a multivariate multilevel model. The correlation structure shows that, once the decision has been made regarding use of antenatal care by the mother for her first observed birth in the data, she does not tend to change this decision for higher order births.