An Empirical Study of Statistical Properties of Variance Partition Coefficients for Multi-Level Logistic Regression Models

Partitioning the variance of a response by design levels is challenging for binomial and other discrete outcomes. Goldstein (2003 Goldstein , H. ( 2003 ). Multilevel Statistical Models. 3rd ed . London : Edward Arnold . [Google Scholar]) proposed four definitions for variance partitioning coefficients (VPC) under a two-level logistic regression model. In this study, we explicitly derived formulae for multi-level logistic regression model and subsequently studied the distributional properties of the calculated VPCs. Using simulations and a vegetation dataset, we demonstrated associations between different VPC definitions, the importance of methods for estimating VPCs (by comparing VPC obtained using Laplace and penalized quasilikehood methods), and bivariate dependence between VPCs calculated at different levels. Such an empirical study lends an immediate support to wider applications of VPC in scientific data analysis.     

Pre‐Going Private Ownership Around the World

Going private transactions are often highly leveraged, and give rise to potential agency conflicts among existing shareholders. But who exactly are those shareholders, and under what legal conditions are these transactions more likely to occur? We examine ownership structure prior to going private transactions in 33 countries around the world from 2002 to 2014. The data indicate strong and consistent evidence that pre‐going private ownership is characterized by higher institutional and corporate ownership. Family ownership lowers the probability of a public to private transaction. Stronger creditor rights increase the probability of going private, particularly for whole company and institutional buyouts.     

International Business and Entrepreneurship Implications of Brexit

This paper provides an overview of the international business and entrepreneurship implications of Brexit. Our perspective is preliminary and based on a review of the practitioner, policy and academic literature over the first month following the Brexit vote. We highlight some of the potentially negative consequences for markets in the UK and around the world that result from barriers to trade and immigration associated with the uncertainty created by Brexit.     

Contested Terrain of the Global Fisheries: “Dolphin-Safe” Tuna,The Panama Declaration,and the Marine Stewardship Council1

ABSTRACT The globalization of socio-economic relations is a central topic of discussion in both the general literature on economy and society and in the area of food and agriculture. Many maintain that we are in a transition from one era, termed Fordism, to another, called Global Post-Fordism. We use the case of two fisheries eco-labeling programs to inform discussions regarding the emergence of stabilizing socio-economic mechanisms in the Global Post-Fordist era. We argue that recent developments in the tuna-dolphin case, the first major experiment with eco-labeling in the fisheries industries, combined with the Marine Stewardship Council, an initiative designed to regulate and certify a system of global “sustainable fisheries” through an eco-labeling program, provide valuable insights into the ideological and organizational structure of salient global actors in the Post-Fordist era. The discussion addresses (1) the contested terrain within the “North” and between the “North” and the “South” regarding eco-legislation to regulate the global fisheries; (2) the fracturing of the environmental movement into “mainstream” and “grassroots” camps and the resulting inability to maintain a coordinated agenda to counter the globalization project; and (3) the emergence of new forms of supranational state-like regulatory mechanisms that combine science with free trade and environmental ideals and propose to resolve the global fisheries crises by providing sustainable socio-economic coordination. We conclude that the emergence of these supra-national state-like NGOs raises important implications for the sovereignty of nation-states and democratic action on the part of subordinate groups opposed to the globalization project.     

What Critical Demography Means to Me

Sociological Forum -     

An Exploratory Analysis of the Value of the Skills of IT Personnel: Their Relationship to IS Infrastructure and Competitive Advantage

Determining and assessing the requisite skills of information technology (IT) personnel have become critical as the value of IT has risen in modern organizations. In addition to technical skills traditionally expected of IT personnel, softer skills like managerial, business, and interpersonal skills have been increasingly cited in previous studies as mandatory for these employees. This paper uses a typology of IT personnel skills—technology management skills, business functional skills, interpersonal skills, and technical skills—and investigates their relationships to two information systems (IS) success variables, IS infrastructure flexibility and the competitive advantage provided by IS. The study investigates these relationships using the perceptions of chief information officers (CIOs) from mostly Fortune 2000 companies. The contributions of this study are: IT personnel skills do affect IS success, technical skills are viewed as the most important skill set in affecting IS infrastructure flexibility and competitive advantage, and modularity is viewed as more valuable to competitive advantage than integration. Several explanations are offered for the lack of positive relationships between the softer IT personnel skills and the dimensions of IS success used in this study.     

Theory of mind,gender, gains in friendships versus peer acceptance and anxious solitude from middle childhood through early adolescence

This investigation proposes that theory of mind (ToM) may be related more strongly to change in friendships than peer acceptance in late middle childhood through early adolescence, and examines the relation between ToM and anxious solitude. Fourth grade ToM was tested as a predictor of change in reciprocated friendships, peer acceptance, and anxious solitude from 4th to 7th grade, and, conversely, reciprocated friendships, peer acceptance, and anxious solitude in 3^rd grade were tested as predictors of 4th grade ToM. Gender moderation of these relations was evaluated. Participants were 688 American public-school children (51.5% girls), 193 of whom completed a ToM questionnaire in 4th grade. In 3rd–7th grade children and their peers reported reciprocated friendship, and peers reported peer acceptance and anxious solitude annually. A multi-group (gender split) autoregressive cross-lagged panel analysis modeled relations between ToM and reciprocated friendship, peer acceptance, and anxious solitude over time. Consistent with hypotheses, girls’ more advanced 4th grade ToM predicted incremental gains in their number of friendships two years later, but not their peer acceptance. In contrast, boys’ more advanced 4th grade ToM did not predict change in their number of friendships or peer acceptance over time. Gender differences in the relation between ToM and friendship are discussed in the context of gender-specific peer relations patterns in late middle childhood and early adolescence. Additionally, more advanced 4th grade ToM predicted gains in anxious solitude in middle school for both genders. This somewhat surprising result is discussed in relation to ToM assessment and peer relations in anxious solitary children.