Modeling Lung Carcinogenesis in Radon‐Exposed Miner Cohorts: Accounting for Missing Information on Smoking

Epidemiological miner cohort data used to estimate lung cancer risks related to occupational radon exposure often lack cohort‐wide information on exposure to tobacco smoke, a potential confounder and important effect modifier. We have developed a method to project data on smoking habits from a case‐control study onto an entire cohort by means of a Monte Carlo resampling technique. As a proof of principle, this method is tested on a subcohort of 35,084 former uranium miners employed at the WISMUT company (Germany), with 461 lung cancer deaths in the follow‐up period 1955–1998. After applying the proposed imputation technique, a biologically‐based carcinogenesis model is employed to analyze the cohort's lung cancer mortality data. A sensitivity analysis based on a set of 200 independent projections with subsequent model analyses yields narrow distributions of the free model parameters, indicating that parameter values are relatively stable and independent of individual projections. This technique thus offers a possibility to account for unknown smoking habits, enabling us to unravel risks related to radon, to smoking, and to the combination of both.     

Understanding managers' preferences for internal markets versus business planning: A comparative study of German and U.S. managers

Internal markets and centralized business planning are alternative organizational designs for coordinating the economic activities within a firm. While some preliminary theory about when to use each exists in the literature, little is known about how managers understand and decide when to use one or the other. The study develops and tests in samples of German and U.S. managers a preliminary theory about factors that influence the preferences of managers for internal markets or planning as alternative modes of coordination. Managers' preferences are influenced by key constructs of internal markets and planning theory (the perceived limits of planning, speed and efficiency of markets, motivation potential of markets), but also by differences in their institutional contexts (national government and business context, company culture, and recent company experience with planning and internal markets). The study is the first to explore the substitutability of internal markets and planning within the strategic decision process of managers, closer to where it becomes reality.     

Is the sociology of deviance still relevant?

This paper discusses whether and to what extent the field of the sociology of deviance is “dead,” relevant to sociology generally, or intellectually vital, and, if it is less vital than it once was, how and why it declined in vigor, and what might be done to return it to its glory days. It also addresses the implications of the election of 2004 for the field of deviance studies. Erich Goode is Professor Emeritus of Sociology at the State University of New York at Stony Brook and senior research scientist in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Maryland at College Park. He is the author of ten books, mainly on drug use and deviant behavior, a recipient of several teaching awards, and a winner of the Guggenheim fellowship.     

The rise and fall? Of mental stress claims in the USA

Occupation-related mental stress has been associated with significant loss in terms of diminished productivity, higher absenteeism, and increased workers' compensation claims. The Liberty Mutual Group workers' compensation data were analysed for the years 1984-93 for mental stress-related claims. This represented over 7 million claims, over 17000 of which were identified as mental stress-related. The proportion of all stress claims was estimated for each year. The proportion by gender, age and occupation (job classification code and occupation name) was also described. Stress claims increased during the late 1980s, peaking in 1991, accounting for 0.48% of all claims and 1.69% of all claims costs, and has declined since. Even at its peak, mental stress claims were not a major portion of workers' compensation losses. However, they are expensive. The average costs of a stress claim in 1993 was about $13000. The state of California accounts for 60% of the claims reported to Liberty Mutual over this 10-year period. In 1993 women accounted for 51% of the stress claims and about 30% of all claims. The mean age of workers with stress claims was 39.3 years, with most stress claims from 30 to 34 year-olds. High-risk occupations and industries include banks, insurance companies, general labourers, management, salespersons, and drivers. The current decline in stress claims can largely be explained by a combination of changes in unemployment, increasing litigation, and changes in law in California and other states that made more stringent the requirements whereby a mental stress claim can be considered work-related. While the data presented are helpful for comparing stress claims to all claims reported to Liberty Mutual and for identifying high-risk occupations and industries, because of the uniqueness of the stress claim selection algorithm and the uncertainties with cost estimates, the cost figures are not directly comparable to other claims reporting systems.     

Misperception of chance and loss repair: On the dynamics of tax compliance

Previous experimental studies on tax behavior have been particularly concerned with determining the absolute effect of detection rate and punishment on tax filing, leading to mixed results. In this paper, we shed some additional light on the effectiveness of audit probability and sanctions by drawing upon a dynamic setting with particular focus on the time lag between audits. Our results showed that tax compliance decreased immediately after a random audit, suggesting that subjects were prone to misperception of chance. Sanctions decreased compliance to a lesser extent; they were, however, associated with the tendency of subjects to repair their losses by increasing their capital stock.     

Marital relationships and purchasing decisions — to buy or not to buy,that is the question

Wives and husbands from 47 households rated their wellbeing in situations, where they imagined either to buy or not to buy a desired product, with their spouse either agreeing or disagreeing with the purchase. The product was female-specific for wives and male-specific for husbands. For 23 households the product was relatively cheap, for 24 households the subjects imagined to desire an expensive commodity. The approach was similar to Kelley and Thibaut's (1978) analysis of interdependence matrices. The data, in general, support the following hypotheses: (a) When the partner objects the purchase, the utility of the product will outweigh the perceived social costs more for husbands than for wives, especially in male-dominated families; (b) the wife's wellbeing with purchase decisions will depend more than her husband's wellbeing upon the partner's agreement, especially in male-dominated families, (c) the husband's wellbeing in conflict (buying a product despite the partner's objection) will be positively related with his dominance and vice versa; (d) mutual appraisal of situations will correspond higher in happy than in unhappy couples.The results are discussed with respect to differences in male and female strategies to cope with authority and social emotions in buying decisions. Shortcomings of economic theories on determinants of family consumer decisions are pointed out.     

Round up the usual suspects: Crime,deviance, and the limits of constructionism

In the 1960s and early 1970s, the sociological study of deviance underwent a sharp break in orientation; many observers in the field began to shift their focus away from an examination of etiology to the study of social control. Examining the social construction of deviance and crime to the exclusion of crucial and unavoidable material features that cannot be defined away lead to certain conclusions that could not be sustained and were vulnerable to successful challenge from later approaches. The lives and work of Frank Tannenbaum, Jack Henry Abbott, and Alvin Gouldner, as well as the work of other labelists and Marxists, offer testimony to the limits of constructionism in the sociological study of deviance and crime.     

Regulatory fit effects on perceived fiscal exchange and tax compliance

Paying taxes can be considered a contribution to the welfare of a society. But even though tax payments are redistributed to citizens in the form of public goods and services, taxpayers often do not perceive many benefits from paying taxes. Information campaigns about the use of taxes for financing public goods and services could increase taxpayers’ understanding of the importance of taxes, strengthen their perception of fiscal exchange and consequently also increase tax compliance. Two studies examined how fit between framing of information and taxpayers’ regulatory focus affects perceived fiscal exchange and tax compliance. Taxpayers should perceive the exchange between tax payments and provision of public goods and services as higher if information framing suits their regulatory focus. Study 1 supported this hypothesis for induced regulatory focus. Study 2 replicated the findings for chronic regulatory focus and further demonstrated that regulatory fit also affects tax compliance. The results provide further evidence for findings from previous studies concerning regulatory fit effects on tax attitudes and extend these findings to a context with low tax morale.