Cues of Men's Parental Investment and Attractiveness for Women: A Field Experiment

An experiment was carried out in which a male confederate, seated at a pavement area of a bar, happened to meet his “sister” (a female confederate) and her baby. In one case, the confederate interacted with the baby, whereas in the other case he paid no attention to him. A few minutes later, while the confederate was alone, he solicited a young woman who was seated near his table and asked her for her phone number. Results showed that when the confederate interacted with the baby, he received more positive responses from women than when he paid no attention to the baby.     

The Future Composition of the Canadian Labor Force: A Microsimulation Projection

This article charts the future transformations of the Canadian labor force population using a microsimulation projection model. The model takes into account differentials in demographic behavior and labor force participation of individuals according to their ethnocultural and educational characteristics. As a result of a rapid fall in fertility, the Canadian population is expected to age rapidly as baby boomers start to retire from the labor market in large numbers. In response to declining fertility, Canada raised its immigration intake at the end of the 1980s, and immigration is now the main driver of Canadian population growth. At the same time, immigrants to Canada are becoming more culturally diversified. Over the last half century, the main source regions have shifted from Europe to Asia. Results of the microsimulation show that Canada's labor force population will continue to increase, but at a slower rate than in the recent past. By 2031, almost one third of the country's total labor force could be foreign‐born, and almost all its future increase is expected to be among university graduates, while the less‐educated labor force is projected to decline.     

Emotional labour profiles: Associations with key predictors and outcomes

ABSTRACT

The present study examines how three emotional labour strategies (hiding feelings, faking emotions, and deep acting) combine within different profiles of workers among two samples characterised by different types and intensity of customer contact. In addition, this research investigates the role of perceived workload as well as perceived organisational support, supervisor support, and colleagues support in the prediction of profile membership. Finally, this research also documents the relation between emotional labour profiles and adaptive and maladaptive work outcomes (job satisfaction, work performance, emotional exhaustion, sleeping problems, psychological detachment, and counterproductive work behaviours). Latent profile analysis revealed three similar emotional labour profiles in both samples. Results also showed the most desirable levels on all outcomes to be associated with Profile 3 (Low Emotional Labor/Low Surface Acting and Moderate Deep Acting), followed by Profile 2 (Moderate Emotional Labor/Moderate Surface Acting and High Deep Acting) and Profile 1 (High Emotional Labor), with most comparisons being statistically significant in both samples. In contrast, a more diversified pattern of findings was observed in the prediction of profile membership. For instance, perceived colleagues support did not predict membership into any of the profiles, while supervisor support predicted an increased likelihood of membership into Profile 3 relative to Profiles 1 and 2.     

Structural learning with time-varying components: tracking the cross-section of financial time series

Summary.  When modelling multivariate financial data, the problem of structural learning is compounded by the fact that the covariance structure changes with time. Previous work has focused on modelling those changes by using multivariate stochastic volatility models. We present an alternative to these models that focuses instead on the latent graphical structure that is related to the precision matrix. We develop a graphical model for sequences of Gaussian random vectors when changes in the underlying graph occur at random times, and a new block of data is created with the addition or deletion of an edge. We show how a Bayesian hierarchical model incorporates both the uncertainty about that graph and the time variation thereof.     

Truthful Equilibria in Dynamic Bayesian Games

This paper characterizes an equilibrium payoff subset for dynamic Bayesian games as discounting vanishes. Monitoring is imperfect, transitions may depend on actions, types may be correlated, and values may be interdependent. The focus is on equilibria in which players report truthfully. The characterization generalizes that for repeated games, reducing the analysis to static Bayesian games with transfers. With independent private values, the restriction to truthful equilibria is without loss, except for the punishment level: if players withhold their information during punishment‐like phases, a folk theorem obtains.     

Uncertainty Distribution Associated with Estimating a Proportion in Microbial Risk Assessment

The uncertainty associated with estimates should be taken into account in quantitative risk assessment. Each input's uncertainty can be characterized through a probabilistic distribution for use under Monte Carlo simulations. In this study, the sampling uncertainty associated with estimating a low proportion on the basis of a small sample size was considered. A common application in microbial risk assessment is the estimation of a prevalence, proportion of contaminated food products, on the basis of few tested units. Three Bayesian approaches (based on beta(0, 0), beta(1/2, 1/2), and beta(l, 1)) and one frequentist approach (based on the frequentist confidence distribution) were compared and evaluated on the basis of simulations. For small samples, we demonstrated some differences between the four tested methods. We concluded that the better method depends on the true proportion of contaminated products, which is by definition unknown in common practice. When no prior information is available, we recommend the beta (1/2, 1/2) prior or the confidence distribution. To illustrate the importance of these differences, the four methods were used in an applied example. We performed two-dimensional Monte Carlo simulations to estimate the proportion of cold smoked salmon packs contaminated by Listeria monocytogenes, one dimension representing within-factory uncertainty, modeled by each of the four studied methods, and the other dimension representing variability between companies.     

Employment growth in the temporary help supply industry

During the 1980s, a significant increase occurred in the employment of temporary workers — employees hired for a specific task and for a limited duration — because of changing economic conditions that raised both the demand for and supply of temporary workers. Using time-series data, we investigate the factors that influenced temporary employment growth by analyzing the expansion in the temporary help supply (THS) industry. On the demand side, increasing aggregate output and heightened foreign competition were the most important factors that encouraged firms to hire temporary workers. On the supply side, increasing participation of certain demographic groups, notably married women, shifted the supply curve of temporary workers outward. We thank Nathan Balke, Bonnie Fisher, and Jeff Mills for helpful comments.     

Which Aspects of Elderly Living Conditions are Important to Predict Mortality? The Complex Role of Family Ties at Home and in Institutions

Social Indicators Research - Besides health and socio-economic status, the social relationships maintained during elderly play an important role in shaping the living conditions at older ages. In...     

Resolving Coparenting Dissatisfaction In Couples: A Preliminary Task Analysis Study

This study explored the change that unfolded when parents resolved their coparenting dissatisfaction during an Integrative Brief Systemic Intervention (IBSI) for parent couples. We conducted a task analysis (Greenberg, 2007) to build a model of resolving coparenting dissatisfaction. We compared a postulated model of change (rational model) based on theoretical and clinical assumptions to the observations of the actual change process that couples experienced in an IBSI (empirical analysis). The empirical analysis was conducted on six IBSI therapy cases (three exhibiting positive development and three exhibiting no development). We defined positive development in IBSI as moving from coparenting dissatisfaction to coparenting satisfaction. The final rational–empirical model included six steps that facilitated the resolution of coparenting dissatisfaction. This study contributes to deepening the knowledge of how coparenting may change during marital therapy.     

Always doing your best? Effort and performance in dynamic settings

Theory and Decision - Achieving an ambitious goal frequently requires succeeding in a sequence of intermediate tasks, some being critical for the final outcome, and others not. However, individuals...