Martingale generalizations and preservation of martingale properties

This article investigates circumstances under which seven important martingale properties are preserved by the following six martingale generalizations: quasimartingales, amarts, martingales in the limit, games fairer with time, progressive martingales, and eventual martingales.     

The influence of macroeconomic variables on the probability of union decertification

This study focuses on the role macroeconomic factors play in explaining the proportion of decertification elections lost by the union movement in the postwar period. Previous research has neglected the importance of such macroeconomic variables. Our results indicate that the union-nonunion wage differential, inflation, strikes, state of the labor market, and union density are related to the phenomenon of decertification. The authors would like to thank Greg Hundley, Mike Bognanno, Paul Schumann, Jim Scoville, the editor, and a reviewer for valuable comments and Michael Wachter and William Wascher for providing some unpublished data.     

INTERVENTION STRATEGIES: PREDICTING FAMILY THERAPY OUTCOME*

A pre-defined list of family therapy intervention strategies was used to predict post-therapy perceived life happiness and marital happiness among husbands and wives. Clients presented with both child and marriage-focused problems. The data were analyzed separately for husbands and wives. In general, favorable outcome for husbands was associated with active restructuring operations on the part of the therapist. Prediction of outcome for wives was less clear. However, wives did appear to respond favorably to less active interventions such as actualizing transactional patterns and reframing.     

Psychophysical conditions and hormonal secretion in nurses on a rapidly rotating shift schedule and exposed to bright light during night work

The psychophysical conditions of 15 young female nurses, working in a rapidly-rotating shift system (2-2-2-2), modified according to some psychophysiological criteria, and exposed to short period (4 × 20 min) of bright light (2350 Lux) during their night duty, were studied in order to evaluate their adaptation to night work and to test a possible positive effect on it of bright light. Subjective evaluations of work load and psychophysical conditions, performance measures, hormonal excretion (cortisol, 6-sulphatoxymelatonin and catecholamines), oral temperature and activity-sleep logs were taken during the shiftwork cycle, comprising one morning, one afternoon and two consecutive nights under normal and bright light. The results showed that this rapidly-rotating shift system had little effect upon the normal circadian rhythms of the body. Moreover, the lengthening of the night shift to 10 h can be considered to be acceptable, provided that work load is reduced and there are sufficient rest pauses available. On the other hand, the reduction to 7 h of the length of the day shifts and delayed start of the morning shift to 07:00 h appeared to be convenient both in relation to the work load and sleep duration. Some positive effects of bright light upon psychophysical conditions and performance efficiency were noted, while hormonal excretion and body temperature did not show any effect of bright light; in particular, melatonin excretion was not suppressed appreciably by the bright light used.     

Psychopathology in pathological gamblers seeking treatment

High rates of psychiatric symptoms have been reported in pathological gamblers. This study of psychiatric comorbidity in pathological gamblers is the first to use structured psychiatric interviews assessing DSM-III-R Axis I and II disorders. The Structured Clinical Interview for DSM III-R (SCID-P, SCID-II) was administered to 40 (25 male, 15 male) pathological gamblers seeking outpatient treatment in Minnesota for gambling, and 64 (41 male, 23 female) controls. High lifetime rates of Axis I (92%) but not Axis II (25%) psychopathology were found in pathological gamblers as compared to controls. No differences between male and female gamblers were found in rates of affective, substance use or personality disorders. Females had higher rates of anxiety disorders and histories of physical/sexual abuse. Possible associations between psychiatric disorders and pathological gambling are discussed along with gambler typologies and implications for future research.The authors wish to gratefully acknowledge the assistance of: Gary Christenson, M.D., Carol Peterson, Ph.D., William Meller, M.D., Thomas Mackenzie, M.D.     

Asymptotic properties of a generalized regression-type predictor of a finite population variance in probability sampling

A system of predictors for estimating a finite population variance is defined and shown to be asymptotically design-unbiased (ADU) and asymptotically design-consistent (ADC) under probability sampling. An asymptotic mean squared error (MSE) of a generalized regression-type predictor, generated from the system, is obtained. The suggested predictor attains the minimum expected variance of any design-unbiased estimator when the superpopulation model is correct. The generalized regression-type predictor and the predictor suggested by Mukhopadhyay (1990) are compared.     

Professor Cuneo's analysis of class exploitation in Canada*

Ce texte examine l'étude faite par le professeur Cuneo sur la relation entre l'exploitation des classes et les conflits manifestes entre les classes au Canada. Nous démontrons que la thèse de Cuneo selon laquelle il existe une relation positive entre ces variables est fausse, étant donné que pour arriver à ses indices, Cuneo s'est servi de statistiques erronnées sur le taux de plus-value, les grèves et les lock-outs.
Profesor Cuneo's study of the relation between class exploitation and overt class conflict in Canada is examined. We show that his finding of a positive relation between these variables is based on errors in constructing his indices of the rate of surplus value and strike and lockout activity.     

The social “R & D” paradigm in child and youth services: Building knowledge convivially

Adaptation of agricultural and industrial research and development models offers new methods for bridging the worlds of research and practice in child and youth services. Social R & D methodologies provide effective means for generating new social technologies because they are product oriented and use a wide array of traditional and nontraditional data sources. This article discusses one social R & D paradigm—Developmental Research and Utilization. Permanency planning and community support systems research are used to illustrate the past and potential application of this methodology to the field of child and youth services.     

A Characterization of a Matric-Variate Exponential Distribution

Suppose S is a positive definite m x m random matrix and S> Ω denotes the event that S—Ω is positive definite, Ω being a constant positive definite matrix. Under very mild regularity conditions, we show that the constraint Pr(S>Ω₁+Ω₂ | S>Ω₂) = Pr(S>Ω₁) implies that S has a Wishart distribution on m+ 1 degrees of freedom.