Fathers’ Use of Childbirth Leave in Spain. The Effects of the 13-Day Paternity Leave

This article investigates, for the case of Spain, to what extent the introduction in March 2007 of a non-transferable 13-day paternity leave has encouraged men to make greater use of childbirth leave. Data were drawn from the Spanish Economically Active Population Survey, covering the period 2005–2009. We use a natural experiment approach, comparing the behavior of wage earners fathers with children of less than 1 year of age before and after the reform and using mothers as control group. After estimating a difference-in-differences logistic regression model we obtain statistical evidence that there is a higher percentage of males on leave in the reference week in the post-reform period (after 2007). The article also analyzes some of the personal and socio-economic determinants of the fathers’ use of childbirth leave. Fathers are more likely to be on leave if they have stability in employment, if there are facilities for reconciling work and family life (working in the public sector) and if the partner is employed. The father’s age has an interesting U-shaped influence.     

The downside of organizational identification: Relations between identification,workaholism and well-being

Abstract

Employee organizational identification has been proposed and found to be positively related to employee health and well-being. The empirical evidence, however, is not unequivocal, and some authors have suggested possible downsides of identification with the organization as a whole or with a group within it. The potential negative effect of over-identification was tested empirically for the first time in the present paper. Two studies were conducted; Study 1 was cross-sectional and used a sample of Italian law court clerks (N=195) and Study 2 was longitudinal and employed a sample of Italian teachers (N=140 at T2). We proposed a curvilinear mediation model with identification curvilinearly predicting workaholism, and workaholism, in turn, negatively affecting employee well-being. This curvilinear link between organizational identification and workaholism means that workaholism at first decreases with growing identification, but when identification becomes too strong, workaholism increases. The results confirmed our hypotheses, and we discuss theoretical and practical implications.     

NONPARAMETRIC STATISTICS IN MULTICRITERIA ANALYSIS

The paper deals with a method of hierarchization of alternatives in a multicriteria environment by means of statistical nonparametric procedures. For each criterion, alternatives are disposed on an ordinal scale. After that a procedure similar to ANOVA is activated on the data. The differences relating to the average ranks of each action are used to build the hierarchical algorithm. The concept of outranking, in a probabilistic meaning, is reached in this way. Thereafter, we arrive at the concept of dominance using pairwise comparisons. A case study is presented which implements the methodological suggestion.     

The rise and fall of collective identity in networked movements: communication protocols,Facebook, and the anti-Berlusconi protest

This paper explores the impact of communication protocols on the development of collective identity in networked movements. It focuses primarily on how communication protocols change patterns of interactions and power relationships among the constituents of social movements. The paper suggests that the communication protocols of commercial social networking media lead to organizational centralization and fragmentation in social movements by eroding one of the preconditions of collective identity, namely solidarity. The empirical material presented is part of a PhD dissertation on a political protest movement and their use of Facebook as a core communication and organizational platform. The data gathering is multi-methodological and relies on both qualitative and quantitative data collection techniques in the form of a historical analysis of interaction patterns, and a content analysis of online conversations among activists.     

First Application of FISK,the Freshwater Fish Invasiveness Screening Kit,in Northern Europe: Example of Southern Finland

The climatic conditions of north temperate countries pose unique influences on the rates of invasion and the potential adverse impacts of non‐native species. Methods are needed to evaluate these risks, beginning with the pre‐screening of non‐native species for potential invasives. Recent improvements to the Fish Invasiveness Scoring Kit (FISK) have provided a means (i.e., FISK v2) of identifying potentially invasive non‐native freshwater fishes in virtually all climate zones. In this study, FISK is applied for the first time in a north temperate country, southern Finland, and calibrated to determine the appropriate threshold score for fish species that are likely to pose a high risk of being invasive in this risk assessment area. The threshold between “medium” and “high” risk was determined to be 22.5, which is slightly higher than the original threshold for the United Kingdom (i.e., 19) and that determined for a FISK application in southern Japan (19.8). This underlines the need to calibrate such decision‐support tools for the different areas where they are employed. The results are evaluated in the context of current management strategies in Finland regarding non‐native fishes.     

Improved Asymptotics of a Decreasing Mean Residual Life Estimator

The mean residual life of a life distribution, X, with a finite mean is defined by M(t) = E[X ? t|X > t] for t ? 0. Kochar et al. (2000 Kochar, S.C., Mukerjee, H., Samaniego, F.J. (2000). Estimation of a monotone mean residual life. Ann. Stat. 28: 905–921.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) provided an estimator of M when it is assumed to be decreasing. They showed that its asymptotic distribution was the same as that of the empirical estimate, but only under very stringent analytic and distributional assumptions. We provide a more general asymptotic theory, and under much weaker conditions. We also provide improved asymptotic confidence bands.     

Strategies for High Risk Reduction and Management as Global Responsibility

In the last decades it has been necessary to face emergencies due to big crisis events caused by anthropic and natural events. In particular modern technological systems have reached such a high level of complexity that even a simple event can influence correct behavior with potential catastrophic consequences. The security and economy of technologically developed countries depends on the correct behavior of this infrastructure and on the continuity of the services that they grant. In this framework, risk management assumes an important role focusing on policies for vulnerability reduction and after-crisis management. It imposes a multidisciplinary and transnational approach in order to establish a common strategy between different countries, studying how to be prepared for disasters and prevent disaster damage. In this paper a preliminary analysis of risk categories is presented, suggesting a number of tentative proposals for risk reduction.     

The estimation of wildlife ungulate abundance using sample area surveys: an application to Maremma Regional Park

Sample surveys for estimating the abundance of wildlife ungulate populations are considered in a design-based approach. On the basis of previous theoretical results, a two-stage sampling is proposed. In the first stage, some spatial units are selected using Lahiri-Midzuno sampling, while in the second stage, the animal abundance in the selected units is estimated by means of plot sampling performed on the faecal accumulation within the units. The statistical properties of the resulting ratio estimator of abundance are outlined. An application of the proposed method for estimating fallow-deer and roe-deer abundance in Maremma Regional Park is described.     

Displacement risk: Unpacking a problematic concept for disaster risk reduction

“Displacement risk” is increasingly central to global policy discourse on disaster risk reduction (DRR), despite its vague formulation and inconsistent use. Different understandings of displacement, its complex relationship with vulnerability, and its ambiguous role as a necessary survival strategy for people in harm's way that also creates or exacerbates risk, hinder its clear conceptualization. This limits the clarity and value of recommendations to “reduce displacement risk” for DRR. The explicit consideration of two complementary aspects of risk related to displacement could support more comprehensive, actionable discourses: (1) the “risk stemming from displacement”, that is, any negative impact people might experience due to displacement, and (2) the “risk of remaining displaced”, that is, of people being displaced for a long time. Consideration of these aspects would allow to better include protection and durable solution perspectives within DRR, integrate displacement in disaster risk and loss assessments and add value to existing DRR efforts.