Accent on Teaching Materials

Review of International Association for Statistical Education Proceedings: Proceedings of the First Scientific Meeting of the International Association for Statistical Education, Lina Brunelli and Guiseppe Cicchitelli, Editors. U.S. $5 (cost of postage) from International Statistical Institute, 428 Prinses Beatrixlann, 2270 AZ Voorburg, The Netherlands. Includes 49 papers presented in Perugia, Italy, in August 1993; 476 pages. Reviewed by Peter Holmes     

Accent on Teaching Materials

A linear combination test for combining several tests of the correlation coefficient in the bivariate normal distribution is proposed. The linear combination test is compared with the well-known Fisher method of combining tests. It is shown by a Monte Carlo study that the linear combination test has a larger power.     

A Mission of Civic Engagement: Undergraduate Students Working with Nonprofit Organizations and Public Sector Agencies to Enhance Societal Wellbeing

Universities in the U.S. have been criticized for not contributing enough to the social well-being of the communities within which they operate, and business schools have been accused of failing to prepare students adequately for careers in business. These criticisms have led to increased focus on service learning, a form of experiential learning that aids students in the application of theoretical knowledge to “real-life” situations—including problems and opportunities—faced by local as well as international communities. Even though service-learning has become fairly popular in business schools throughout the U.S., there is relatively little literature that illuminates its application. Thus, the present article describes a service-learning project in a marketing research course and how this project supports the university’s mission of civic engagement. Included are also a discussion of course-specific objectives as well as learning goals, objectives, and assessments as commonly required by regional and national accreditation agencies.     

The Relationship Between Hope,Eustress, Self-Efficacy,and Life Satisfaction Among Undergraduates

The construct of eustress was studied alongside hope and self-efficacy, to explore how these constructs are related to life satisfaction among undergraduates. Questionnaires were administered to undergraduates to test the hypotheses that (1) as eustress levels increase, so will life satisfaction levels; (2) when eustress, hope, and self-efficacy are examined together, they will predict life satisfaction better than eustress alone; (3) eustress, hope, and self-efficacy will all be positively correlated with life satisfaction; and (4) self-efficacy will be the most positively correlated with life satisfaction. The results revealed a significant positive correlation between eustress and life satisfaction. A Hierarchical Linear Regression analysis revealed significant results supporting hypotheses 2 and 3, but not hypothesis 4. Results indicated that hope is the best predictor of life satisfaction. The work reported provides a reliable tool for measuring eustress, examines eustress in a new way at the academic level, and provides helpful information about student wellness to college administrators.     

Determining the effects of intraclass correlation on factorial experiments

This paper considers the effects of the presence of eqmi-correlation between observations in a k-way factorial experiment, A technique to provide unbiased F-tests is also constructed.     

RESEARCH NOTE Some evidence against the assumption that approval of family planning is associated with frequency of spouses' discussion of the subject

Much previous work on the relationship between respondent's reported frequency of discussion with spouse about family planning and correctness of reporting spouse's approval of family planning has led to the conclusion that discussion promotes approval. In this paper, data from the 1998 Kenya Demographic and Health Surveys are used to show that a focus on the relationship between frequency of discussion and correctness of reporting partner's disapproval of family planning leads to sceptical conclusions about the effects of discussion in improving knowledge of partner's attitude or in promoting approval.     

Regional Religions?: Extending the “Semi-involuntary” Thesis of African-American Religious Participation

This research examines religious affiliation and church attendance among African-Americans in three different regions of the United States to evaluate the thesis that the Black church represents a semi-involuntary institution shaped by historical dynamics of segregation in the rural South. We extend the analyses of others who have found the rural South to have distinctive church participation patterns by examining two nationally representative data sets (the 1972–1996 General Social Surveys and the 1984 National Alcohol Study). We explore both level and type of church attendance of African-Americans, and how patterns differ by region. Further, we refine prior analyses by (1) differentiating between members of historically White and conservative churches from those in the black mainline, (2) examining racial segregation, and (3) focusing on the type of church attendance (rather than just overall level). Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) and logistic regression models support the thesis that the rural South exhibits some distinctive patterns that make the semi-involuntary institution notion a useful concept, although patterns not predicted by the thesis are also found. The semi-involuntary thesis is also used to illuminate some church attendance patterns observed outside the rural South.     

Forecasting organizational changes

In this article the author argues that because of the difficulties associated with human behaviour such factors are frequently omitted from forecasts. Yet no organization can afford to disregard these factors if their forecasts are to be meaningful. The author includes illustrations of organizational change which he maintains will spread rapidly. Finally he discusses his own initial experiments in forecasting organizational change.