Landscape,vegetation characteristics,and group identity in an urban and suburban watershed: why the 60s matter

As highly managed ecosystems, urban areas should reflect the social characteristics of their managers, who are primarily residents. Since landscape features develop over time, we hypothesize that present-day vegetation should also reflect social characteristics of past residents. Using an urban-to-suburban watershed in the Baltimore Metropolitan Region, this paper examines the relationship between demographics, housing characteristics, and lifestyle clusters from 1960 and 2000 with areas of high woody and herbaceous vegetation cover in 1999. We find that 1960 demographics and age of housing are better predictors of high woody or tree coverage in 1999 than demographics and housing characteristics from 2000. Key variables from 1960 are percent in professional occupations (+), percent of pre-WWI housing (−), percent of post-WWII housing (+), and population density (−). Past and present demographic and housing variables are poor predictors of high herbaceous cover in 1999. Lifestyle clusters for 2000 are very good predictors of high herbaceous coverage in 1999, but lifestyle clusters from 1960 and 2000 are poor predictors of high woody vegetation coverage. These findings suggest that herbaceous or grassy areas, typically lawns, are good reflections of contemporary lifestyle characteristics of residents while neighborhoods with heavy tree canopies have largely inherited the preferred landscapes of past residents and communities. Biological growth time scales of trees and woody vegetation means that such vegetation may outlast the original inhabitants who designed, purchased, and planted them. The landscapes we see today are therefore legacies of past consumption patterns.     

Error Bands for Impulse Responses

We show how correctly to extend known methods for generating error bands in reduced form VAR's to overidentified models. We argue that the conventional pointwise bands common in the literature should be supplemented with measures of shape uncertainty, and we show how to generate such measures. We focus on bands that characterize the shape of the likelihood. Such bands are not classical confidence regions. We explain that classical confidence regions mix information about parameter location with information about model fit, and hence can be misleading as summaries of the implications of the data for the location of parameters. Because classical confidence regions also present conceptual and computational problems in multivariate time series models, we suggest that likelihood-based bands, rather than approximate confidence bands based on asymptotic theory, be standard in reporting results for this type of model.     

A Dynamic Model of Demand for Houses and Neighborhoods

This paper develops a dynamic model of neighborhood choice along with a computationally light multi‐step estimator. The proposed empirical framework captures observed and unobserved preference heterogeneity across households and locations in a flexible way. We estimate the model using a newly assembled data set that matches demographic information from mortgage applications to the universe of housing transactions in the San Francisco Bay Area from 1994 to 2004. The results provide the first estimates of the marginal willingness to pay for several non‐marketed amenities—neighborhood air pollution, violent crime, and racial composition—in a dynamic framework. Comparing these estimates with those from a static version of the model highlights several important biases that arise when dynamic considerations are ignored.     

Future Directions in the Study of Close Relationships: Conflict Is Bad (Except When It's Not)

Beneficial and detrimental correlates of interpersonal disagreement have been postulated and documented. The conclusion: conflict is both bad and good. The evidence for these paradoxical effects is summarized. In this article, we argue that the consequences of conflict for individuals depend on its frequency, the way in which it is managed, and the quality of the relationship in which it arises. Non‐linear patterns of association are hypothesized such that constructive conflicts, particularly those arising in supportive relationships, should (up to a limit) predict more beneficial and fewer detrimental outcomes. In contrast, coercive conflicts, particularly those arising in unsupportive relationships, should predict more adverse and fewer favorable outcomes.     

We care about care: advice by children in care for children in care,foster parents and child welfare workers about the transition into foster care

Twenty children in foster care, ages 8 to 15 years, provided advice to children in care, foster parents and child welfare workers about ways to assist service delivery during the transition into foster care. The children discussed the importance of tending to experiences such as foster home expectations, the importance of time and information, the new foster/parent–child relationship, coping with stress, the ability to be engaged in decision‐making, the benefits of foster care and the need to build a trusting and personal relationship between children in care and their caregivers. The importance of listening to children's experiences of the transition into foster care and incorporating their advice into future research, policy and practice will be discussed.     

Therapist Effects on Disparities Experienced by Minorities Receiving Services for Mental Illness

OBJECTIVES: The authors examine if some of the reason clients from racial and ethnic minority groups experience outcome disparities is explained by their therapists. METHOD: Data from 98 clients (19% minority) and 14 therapists at two community mental health agencies where clients from racial and ethnic minority groups were experiencing outcome disparities were analyzed using hierarchical linear modeling with treatment outcomes at Level 1, client factors at Level 2, and therapists at Level 3. RESULTS: There were substantial therapist effects that moderated the relationship between clients' race and treatment outcomes (outcome disparities). Therapists accounted for 28.7% of the variability in outcome disparities. CONCLUSIONS: Therapists are linked to outcome disparities and appear to play a substantial role in why disparities occur.     

Divorce Insurance: Mitigating the Adjudication Period Financial Crisis

Divorce can subject both parties in a troubled marriage to one of the most emotionally and financially trying periods they will experience in their life. Much attention has been given toward life after divorce—either the decisions such as custody of children that will influence this, or the changed circumstances that both parties will find themselves facing. Yet the period from filing to final grant of a divorce poses additional challenges on top of the emotional uncertainties suffered during this period. Total household expenses might double or triple as a result of spouses seeking separate residences, legal bills, added travel, and other expenses forced by a divorce. At the same time, disruptions in one's personal life due to a divorce can disrupt job performance, and in certain situations, even make it difficult or impossible to work; household income can drop accordingly. This article proposes a workable insurance solution to alleviate this second lesser known challenge that a changed financial situation imposes on couples during the divorce adjudication period.