Comparing a survey and a conjoint study: the future vision of water intermediaries

This paper compares and contrasts two methods of obtaining opinions using questionnaires. As the name suggests, a conjoint study makes it possible to consider several attributes jointly. Conjoint analysis is a statistical method to analyse preferences. However, conjoint analysis requires a certain amount of effort by the respondent. The alternative is ordinary survey questions, answered one at a time. Survey questions are easier to grasp mentally, but they do not challenge the respondent to prioritize. This investigation has utilized both methods, survey and conjoint, making it possible to compare them on real data. Attribute importance, attribute correlations, case clustering and attribute grouping are evaluated by both methods. Correspondence between how the two methods measure the attribute in question is also given. Overall, both methods yield the same picture concerning the relative importance of the attributes. Taken one attribute at a time, the correspondence between the methods varies from good to no correspondence. Considering all attributes together by cluster analysis of the cases, the conjoint and survey data yield different cluster structures. The attributes are grouped by factor analysis, and there is reasonable correspondence. The data originate from the EU project 'New Intermediary services and the transformation of urban water supply and wastewater disposal systems in Europe'.     

Defense Industry Restructuring: Trends in European and U.S. Defense Companies

The national defense industries have recognized that world circumstances have changed and consequently some radical changes are also required in their own structures. Increased concentration of defense production indicates that the central defense-industrial policy dilemma between the benefits of economies of scale and the benefits of competition has gradually been resolved in favor of scale economies. This article analyses the restructuring underway from a political-business perspective. It compares the different forms of corporate linkage ranging from full merger and takeover via less dramatic ties associated with strategic alliances and minority shareholdings to joint ventures. In particular, it explores these approaches from the perspective of their suitability to restructuring in the politically sensitive defense industry when the process spans national boundaries. The structure of the analysis involves an assessment of the progress of the U.S. defense industry and identification of the drives for change and the underlying dynamics of this industry. This gives a platform for a parallel analysis of pressures and changes among the European defense industry, leading to an analysis of how U.S. and European companies are placed regarding the industrial trends towards globalization.     

The glass ceiling – where is it? Women's and men's career prospects in the private vs. the public sector in Sweden 1979–2000

Previous research suggests that women have more limited career opportunities than men. Using Swedish longitudinal data, covering the period between 1979 and 2000, more light is shed on the association between hierarchical levels and differences between men's and women's career opportunities in terms of occupational transitions. The analyses indicate that women face the greatest hinderance to advancement at lower hierarchical levels and that these disadvantages attenuate with higher hierarchical levels. These results contradict the common idea of a glass ceiling, ie that problems for women accrue with increasing hierarchical levels. The findings point to the need for focusing more on gender inequalities at low hierarchical positions although the glass ceiling hypothesis cannot be dismissed altogether. Moreover, the results do not support the view that the gender penalty in careers is larger in the private sector as compared to the public sector.     

Delete-m Jackknife for Unequal m

In this paper, the delete-mj jackknife estimator is proposed. This estimator is based on samples obtained from the original sample by successively removing mutually exclusive groups of unequal size. In a Monte Carlo simulation study, a hierarchical linear model was used to evaluate the role of nonnormal residuals and sample size on bias and efficiency of this estimator. It is shown that bias is reduced in exchange for a minor reduction in efficiency. The accompanying jackknife variance estimator even improves on both bias and efficiency, and, moreover, this estimator is mean-squared-error consistent, whereas the maximum likelihood equivalents are not.     

Subjective well-being

This paper examines the notion of “subjective well-being” as it is used in literature on subjective measures of well-being. I argue that those who employ the notion differ at least superficially on at least two points: first, about the relationship between subjective well-being and well-being simpliciter, and second, about the constituents of subjective well-being. In an effort to reconcile the differences, I propose an interpretation according to which subjective measures presuppose preference hedonism: an account according to which well-being is a matter of desired mental states.     

Detection of biomass change in a Norwegian mountain forest area using small footprint airborne laser scanner data

Different approaches for estimation of change in biomass between two points in time by means of airborne laser scanner data were tested. Both field and laser data were collected at two occasions on 52 sample plots in a mountain forest in southeastern Norway. In the first approach, biomass change was estimated as the difference between predicted biomass for the two measurement occasions. Joint models for the biomass at both occasions were fitted using different height and density variables from laser data as explanatory variables. The second approach modelled the observed change directly using the change in different variables extracted from the laser data as explanatory variables. In the third approach we modelled the relative change in biomass. The explanatory variables were also expressed as relative change between measurement occasions. In all approaches we allowed spline terms to be entered. We also investigated the aptness of models for which the residual variance was modeled by allowing it to be proportional to the area of the plot on which biomass was assessed. All alternative models were initially assessed by AIC. All models were also evaluated by estimating biomass change on the model development data. This evaluation indicated that the two direct approaches (approach 2 and 3) were better than relying on modeling biomass at both occasions and taking change as the difference between biomass estimates. Approach 2 seemed to be slightly better than approach 3 based on assessments of bias in the evaluation.     

Additive manufacturing technology adoption: an empirical analysis of general and supply chain-related determinants

Despite experiencing immense growth in the past decade, additive manufacturing (AM) technologies—colloquially known as 3D-printing—are still rarely used in industrial fabrication. Being at the interface between technology, innovation, behavioral science and operations management research, this paper identifies multifaceted factors that determine the decision to adopt AM technologies for the production of industrial parts. A review of the relevant literature revealed eight potential factors. These can be classified into four interdisciplinary categories: technology-related factors, firm-related-factors, market structure-related factors, and supply chain-related factors. Special focus is placed on the impact of supply chain-related issues, because there are indicatives that these aspects have an influence on the decision to adopt AM technologies since AM may offer distinct opportunities for both, the supply- and demand-side of a firm’s operations. No work in the field of manufacturing technology adoption has examined the role of such inter-organizational factors before. The results of an empirical study among 195 firms indicate that demand-side benefits and compatibility are the main determinants of AM technology adoption. This suggests that not only intra- but also inter-organizational factors should be considered when investigating the adoption of technological innovations. Furthermore, it is carved out that the adoption of AM technologies has an interdisciplinary nature.