Dealing with unknown variables in policy/program evaluation

A leading objection to the feasibility of applying benefit-cost analysis in evaluation is that one often cannot know the benefits, the costs, or the probabilities of their occurring for a given proposal. Threshold analysis involves handling unknown variables by converting relevant evaluation problems into questions as to whether a given benefit, cost, probability, or combination of these elements is more or less than a threshold. Above the threshold, the proposed program would be relatively profitable; and below the threshold, it would be relatively unprofitable. Applying that analysis may require the drawing of simple graphs to stimulate the minds of knowledgeable persons as to the range of the actual benefits, costs or probabilities. The approach can be applied when the benefits or the costs are either monetary or nonmonetary, and when the problems involve either go/no-go decisions or conflicting-choice decisions.     

Danish home care policy and the family: implications for the United States

This paper provides an overview of reforms in Danish long-term care initiated in the early 1980s, describes the relationship between elder care in Denmark and the family, and considers implications for U.S. policy. The success of Denmark's community-based experimentation with new models of home care and housing for the elderly resulted in a national decision to eliminate new construction of nursing homes and increase access to publicly funded home care. Lingering concern that the provision of paid assistance for the elderly could undermine family structure is allayed by the findings of a recent survey: Three-fourths of the elderly report seeing their children on a weekly or more frequent basis. Findings from the Danish experience provide evidence that community-based services can aid family caregivers, enable the frail elderly to live in the setting of their choice, and be cost-effective from a public policy perspective.     

Fisher's Hypergeometric Test for a Comparison in a Finite Population

Graphical methods have played a central role in the development of statistical theory and practice. This presentation briefly reviews some of the highlights in the historical development of statistical graphics and gives a simple taxonomy that can be used to characterize the current use of graphical methods. This taxonomy is used to describe the evolution of the use of graphics in some major statistical and related scientific journals.

Some recent advances in the use of graphical methods for statistical analysis are reviewed, and several graphical methods for the statistical presentation of data are illustrated, including the use of multicolor maps.     

A Network Therapy Clinic for Clients with Intellectual Disability

Over the past 30 years a systemic approach has been applied to complex cases involving intellectual disability and behaviours of concern. This paper describes a model that draws on systemic family therapy and network therapy as well as the use of a reflective team. A single session intervention was provided for families of people with intellectual disability. A systemic consultation was used as a pre‐session meeting for professionals working with the family. The systemic consultation and single session therapy allowed the family and the professional network to gain insight. Involving the professionals in the therapy session also enhanced the alliance between professionals and family. This approach assists everyone involved in the case to find a way to progress.     

Principles for Conduct of Pest Risk Analyses: Report of an Expert Workshop

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) have focused attention on risk assessment of potential insect, weed, and animal pests and diseases of livestock. These risks have traditionally been addressed through quarantine protocols ranging from limits on the geographical areas from which a product may originate, postharvest disinfestation procedures like fumigation, and inspections at points of export and import, to outright bans. To ensure that plant and animal protection measures are not used as nontariff trade barriers, GATT and NAFTA require pest risk analysis (PRA) to support quarantine decisions. The increased emphasis on PRA has spurred multiple efforts at the national and international level to design frameworks for the conduct of these analyses. As approaches to pest risk analysis proliferate, and the importance of the analyses grows, concerns have arisen about the scientific and technical conduct of pest risk analysis. In January of 1997, the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis (HCRA) held an invitation-only workshop in Washington, D.C. to bring experts in risk analysis and pest characterization together to develop general principles for pest risk analysis. Workshop participants examined current frameworks for PRA, discussed strengths and weaknesses of the approaches, and formulated principles, based on years of experience with risk analysis in other setting and knowledge of the issues specific to analysis of pests. The principles developed highlight the both the similarities of pest risk analysis to other forms of risk analysis, and its unique attributes.     

Internal Migration and Urban Change in Poland

The paper investigates population change and migration over the period 1984–1994 for communes. There are important conclusions emerging from this study. The first is that we are watching now a profound change of population redistribution patterns in Poland. We observed that direct upwards hierarchical mobility has been markedly modified. The first modification is the substantial reduction of migration from rural to urban locations. There were important changes in the role of cities and towns. Largest cities, massive gainers of the seventies and eighties, have tended to lose population in the mid-nineties. It is likely that they lose population mainly to the neighbouring communes. We believe that a suburbanization process has been put into motion. Medium to large sized towns and cities, in the range between 50,000 and 500,000 as well as small, but not the smallest, towns attract substantial parts of the migration pool.     

Evidence‐based Management in Practice: Opening up the Decision Process,Decision‐maker and Context

Evidence‐based management (EBM) has been subject to a number of persuasive critiques in recent years. Concerns have been raised that: EBM over‐privileges rationality as a basis for decision‐making; ‘scientific’ evidence is insufficient and incomplete as a basis for management practice; understanding of how EBM actually plays out in practice is limited; and, although ideas were originally taken from evidence‐based medicine, individual‐situated expertise has been forgotten in the transfer. To address these concerns, the authors adopted an approach of ‘opening up’ the decision process, the decision‐maker and the context (Langley et al. ( 1995 ). ‘Opening up decision making: the view from the black stool’, Organization Science, 6, pp. 260–279). The empirical investigation focuses on an EBM decision process involving an operations management problem in a hospital emergency department in Australia. Based on interview and archival research, it describes how an EBM decision process was enacted by a physician manager. It identifies the role of ‘fit’ between the decision‐maker and the organizational context in enabling an evidence‐based process and develops insights for EBM theory and practice.     

Aiming for Excellence: Reflections on the Advanced Institute of Management Research and its Elite

In 2002, the UK government launched the Advanced Institute of Management Research, a major initiative intended to raise the quality of research in business schools. Rather than offering research grants in open competition, AIM deliberately funded a select few leading lights in management. Insufficient allowance was made for the Research Assessment Exercise, which measured research excellence in terms of papers published in top journals. The AIM's elite exploited its existing publishing advantage, and AIM provided further resources to aid their efforts. The AIM recruited willing acolytes to work with its elite in fashioning the sort of papers required by the top journals of management – positive papers, consensual and endlessly citable. Analysis of the publishing patterns of AIM senior fellows reveals research cliques and publication silos rather than a network organization. Much as the elite saw its AIM funding as recognition of its own excellence, so AIM itself came to be seen as acknowledgement of the excellence of management research as a whole. That AIM existed to raise management research from intellectual poverty was forgotten. The AIM was wound up in 2012, having spent £30 million, most of it on the subject's elite. The problems that beset management research remain.     

Does the number of sex partners affect educational attainment? Evidence from female respondents to the Add Health

We use data on young women from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health to explore the relationship between number of sex partners and educational attainment. Using the average physical development of male schoolmates to generate plausibly exogenous variation in number of sex partners, instrumental variables estimates suggest that number of sex partners is negatively related to educational attainment. This result is consistent with the argument that romantic involvements are time consuming and can impose substantial emotional costs on young women.