Sugar,Land Markets and the Williams Thesis: Evidence from Jamaica's Property Sales, 1750–1810

The economic-history literature of eighteenth-century British America is rich in its quantitative measures of staple production, output prices and demography, but relatively thin in its analysis of input prices. This paper addresses one aspect of this gap by, for the first time, applying a hedonic regression technique to land sales in Britain's most important colony. The results indicate that land values increased over the course of the late eighteenth century, despite economic challenges such as the American Revolution and a series of punishing hurricanes in the 1780s. The model estimates that values reached their peak in 1800, only to decline during the first decade of the nineteenth century.     

Blended Learning in Rural Social Work Education: Reflections from a New Australian Bachelor of Social Work Course

This paper explores the developmental stages and phases of a new blended learning social work course at a rural Australian university. The background to the development of the discipline will be presented, with an exploration of the challenges and outcomes of designing an interactive online environment for a single cohort of on-campus and distance students. Themes explored cover engaging students, motivation, acculturation and facilitation. The paper concludes with the presentation of data from wave one of a longitudinal survey to ensure student expectations are being met, while at the same time providing an accredited programme of study.     

Prospective study of birth interval dynamics in rural Bangladesh

A group of 209 married, fecund women in rural Bangladesh were studied prospectively for 24 months from 1969 to 1971 to define some of the biological and sociological factors relating to fertility performance. These women were selected from a larger study population of 112,000 that had been followed with a daily house-to-house vital registration programme since 1966. The selected women were interviewed bi-weekly and were asked questions about menstruation, pregnancy, lactation, husband's occupational absences, and monthly urine tests for pregnancy were taken. The results for 193 non-contracepting women revealed that the seasonal pattern of births previously observed in this population could be associated with a corresponding seasonal pattern of conceptions and that this was due to a seasonal trend in fecundability. The highest conception rates were in the coolest months of the year. Post-partum lactational amenorrhoea was very prolonged, averaging 17 months for women with a surviving child. The appearance of the first post-partum menstrual flow (onset of ovulation) also had a seasonal trend which could not be adequately explained. The median waiting time to conception, once menstruation had resumed was eight months. This interval was influenced by seasonal fluctuations, as well as by the age of women and by husbands' absences. The foetal wastage rate was 15·0 per 100 conceptions, with 62 per cent of the foetal losses occurring during the second month of gestation. Overall, the average birth interval was 33 months, with the prolonged lactational amenorrhoea accounting for almost 45 per cent of this interval.      

Maternal,prenatal and traditional practice factors associated with perinatal mortality in Yemen

Background

Perinatal mortality remains a major international problem responsible for nearly six million stillbirths and neonatal deaths.

Auditor independence, corporate governance and aggressive financial reporting: an empirical analysis

This paper seeks to provide empirical evidence on the efficacy of three important governance mechanisms (auditors, directors, and institutional shareholders) in constraining aggressive financial reporting, proxied by abnormal accruals. It also examines the effects of the Sarbanes–Oxley Act (SOX) on their efficacy. Using a sample of US firms audited by the Big 5 (4) auditors between 2000 and 2004, we document a positive relation between abnormal accruals (our proxy for financial reporting aggressiveness) and auditors’ economic dependence on their clients. Furthermore, we find that this relation is driven by firms with weak non-auditor governance mechanisms before and after the enactment of SOX. The results suggest that aggressive financial reporting occurs only when multiple governance mechanisms ‘fail’. More specifically, such type of reporting requires that a highly dependent auditor operates in a ‘poor’ governance setting. Thus, the paper underscores the importance of strong governance in constraining aggressive financial reporting. Moreover, our results suggest that governance regulation (such as SOX) is not a substitute for strong governance mechanisms and thus caution against the over reliance on SOX-type legislation in other parts of the world.     

Death anxiety in Kuwaiti middle-aged personnel

The present study aimed to examine the level of death anxiety, the sex-related differences among a middle-aged Kuwaiti personnel sample, and to explore the replicability of the Arabic Scale of Death Anxiety (ASDA) factors. A sample of 236 volunteer Kuwaiti personnel took part in the study. The mean ages of men and women were 41.5 (SD = 7.5) and 40.9 (SD = 7.1), respectively. The alpha reliability of the ASDA was found to be high (.93). Women had a significantly higher mean total score on the ASDA as well as on 17 out of its 20 items. Middle-aged personnel had a significantly lower mean ASDA total score than younger college students (M age = 22). The factor analysis of the ASDA items yielded three factors: fear of dead people and tombs; fear of postmortem events; and fear of lethal disease. These factors were highly replicable with previous factors extracted from a Kuwaiti college student sample. On the basis of the present findings, there are three general conclusions as follows: death anxiety is negatively associated with age; the sex-related differences on death anxiety are salient in the Arab samples; and the ASDA has a highly replicable factor structure.     

Asset Management Performance and Reputation Building for Large US Firms

Corporate audiences construct the reputation of firms by interpreting informational signals about the firms from various monitors. Of importance to these parties are signals about asset management. The results of our empirical study of 114 large US firms supported the general hypothesis that corporate audiences construct reputations on the basis of information about firms' asset management performance, specifically using market and accounting signals indicating size of the assets, market assessment of the value of the assets in place, asset turnover and profit margin.     

Supervisor commitment to employees: Does agreement among supervisors' and employees' perceptions matter?

Using 322 matched employee–supervisor dyads, we investigate how level and direction of employee–supervisor (dis)agreement on supervisor's affective commitment to the employee relate to organizational commitment, emotional exhaustion, leader–member exchange, and job performance. Results from polynomial regression and response surface analyses indicate that level of employee–supervisor agreement matters: the most beneficial outcomes appear when supervisors and employees agree that the supervisor is highly committed to the employee whereas the least favorable outcomes appear when dyads' members agree that the supervisor has low commitment to the employee. Direction of employee–supervisor disagreement is also important as employee overestimation of supervisor commitment is associated with more favorable outcomes than employee underestimation. However, for two of the outcomes (organizational commitment and emotional exhaustion), the effect of employee–supervisor disagreement was attributable to a main effect of employee perceptions of supervisor commitment. We discuss the implications of these findings for the understanding of employee–supervisor relationships.     

Traditional kinship foster care in northern Ghana: the experiences and views of children, carers and adults in Tamale

Surveys were employed to explore the experiences of children in care and their carers about traditional fostering. They also examined the perspectives of randomly selected adults in the community about the practice of traditional foster care in the Tamale area of northern Ghana. The 74 participants responded to closed- and open-ended interview questions about traditional foster care. Frequencies and thematic grouping of qualitative responses showed that the need to keep family ties alive was the key reason for placement of children with family and kin. Majority of the children expressed satisfaction with living in foster care, even though they had experienced physical and emotional abuse and intimidation. Although most carers were not formally employed and had little personal income, they were positive about having the care role, but faced challenges in providing for many children in a difficult economic situation. The report highlights the role of reciprocity, altruistic and socio-cultural factors in quality of care, and the potential for the traditional kinship foster care to provide suitable avenues of placement for children as recommended by the Ghana child rights law. It also identifies the need for education for carers around children's needs and Ghana's child rights law.