Cultural capital and perception of teacher-student relationships: Uncovering inequalities at schools in China

A long tradition in stratification research argues students with higher cultural capital are likely to be treated by their teachers as possessing the “right culture,” which positively affects their academic performance. Nevertheless, the literature has paid little attention to the role of students' perception in this process. Using two waves of the China Educational Panel Survey, we investigate how students' cultural capital affects their own understanding of teacher-student interactions, including its gender difference. Fixed effects regressions show a substantially positive effect of cultural capital on the perceived frequency of teachers praising and calling on students to answer questions across subjects. Nonetheless, we also find the lack of cultural capital is not punished and that the cultural capital's effect varies across its specific components and gender. These findings pave the way for elucidating the entire causal chain of intergenerational social inequality via cultural capital, teacher bias, students’ perception, and their educational outcomes.     

Incorporating preference information in interactive reference point methods for multiobjective optimization

In this paper, we introduce new ways of utilizing preference information specified by the decision maker in interactive reference point based methods. A reference point consists of desirable values for each objective function. The idea is to take the desires of the decision maker into account more closely when projecting the reference point onto the set of nondominated solutions. In this way we can support the decision maker in finding the most satisfactory solutions faster. In practice, we adjust the weights in the achievement scalarizing function that projects the reference point. We identify different cases depending on the amount of additional information available and demonstrate the cases with examples. Finally, we summarize results of extensive computational tests that give evidence of the efficiency of the ideas proposed.     

Rivalry and strategic groups: what makes a company a rival?

Strategic group literature has generated a significant amount of research over recent decades. However, the rivalry implications of strategic group have remained unclear. This paper analyses rivalry and strategic groups in the house building industry in a small town from a cognitive approach. We consider rivalry as a subjective and directional phenomenon. Estimating rivalry as the direct identification of competitors we try to explain whether similarity affects rivalry and what factors make a company a “rival”. Results show that perceived rivalry is strongly related to size, past performance, subjective similarity and strategic group structure.

The Burr XII System of densities: properties,regression model and applications

We introduce a new class of distributions called the Burr XII system of densities with two extra positive parameters. We provide a comprehensive treatment of some of its mathematical properties. We estimate the model parameters by maximum likelihood. We assess the performance of the maximum likelihood estimators in terms of biases and mean squared errors by means of a simulation study. We also introduce a new family of regression models based on this system of densities. The usefulness of the proposed models is illustrated by means of three real data sets.     

The negative binomial–beta Weibull regression model to predict the cure of prostate cancer

In this article, for the first time, we propose the negative binomial–beta Weibull (BW) regression model for studying the recurrence of prostate cancer and to predict the cure fraction for patients with clinically localized prostate cancer treated by open radical prostatectomy. The cure model considers that a fraction of the survivors are cured of the disease. The survival function for the population of patients can be modeled by a cure parametric model using the BW distribution. We derive an explicit expansion for the moments of the recurrence time distribution for the uncured individuals. The proposed distribution can be used to model survival data when the hazard rate function is increasing, decreasing, unimodal and bathtub shaped. Another advantage is that the proposed model includes as special sub-models some of the well-known cure rate models discussed in the literature. We derive the appropriate matrices for assessing local influence on the parameter estimates under different perturbation schemes. We analyze a real data set for localized prostate cancer patients after open radical prostatectomy.     

A general threshold stress hybrid hazard model for lifetime data

In this paper we propose a hybrid hazard regression model with threshold stress which includes the proportional hazards and the accelerated failure time models as particular cases. To express the behavior of lifetimes the generalized-gamma distribution is assumed and an inverse power law model with a threshold stress is considered. For parameter estimation we develop a sampling-based posterior inference procedure based on Markov Chain Monte Carlo techniques. We assume proper but vague priors for the parameters of interest. A simulation study investigates the frequentist properties of the proposed estimators obtained under the assumption of vague priors. Further, some discussions on model selection criteria are given. The methodology is illustrated on simulated and real lifetime data set.     

Competitive Strategies and Firm Performance: a Comparative Analysis of Pure,Hybrid and ‘Stuck‐in‐the‐middle’ Strategies in Spanish Firms

The purpose of this study was to examine the viability of hybrid competitive strategies, which combine differentiation and cost elements, and their impact on organizational performance in comparison to pure strategies and ‘stuck‐in‐the‐middle’ combinations. Previous studies have focused above all on US data. The analysis carried out in this paper has centred on a multisectorial sample of 164 Spanish firms. The findings show that a large number of the organizations use different types of hybrid strategies and also that such strategies tend to be associated with higher levels of firm performance, particularly those strategies which place emphasis on a greater number of strategic dimensions, and specifically on innovation differentiation.     

Organizational status growth and structure: An alliance network analysis

Considering the status system emerging from a structure of corporate affiliations, we examine how alliance patterns among firms affect their changing organizational statuses and the structural development of the status system itself. Firm status is conceptually grounded in sociological theories of status and network analysis. The empirical setting we investigate is the network of alliances among firms in the Global Information Sector. The results indicate a negative effect of initial firm status on the growth rate of individual status, which is associated with the different patterns of alliance affiliations among firms with different status levels. Affiliation patterns also affect the extent of variation in the gap between status strata and firm mobility along the status hierarchy. The results highlight the importance of understanding the structural aspects underlying firm status attainment.     

Moving Fragments

This article examines three films as they wrestle with the problem of madness through the construction of narrative: Grizzly Man (Director, Werner Herzog, 2005), Capturing the Friedmans (Director, Andrew Jarecki, 2003), and Tarnation (Director, Jonathan Caouette, 2003). There is progression in the narrative capacities depicted and enacted in each film: from the representation of a boundary with the unsymbolizable, through the failed figuration of sexuality, to the realization of a self-reflexive and thus transformational narrative. Working at the intersection of the personal and the social, the article postulates that films can serve as social containers for the elaboration of narratives that allow subjective cultural intelligibility. We are transformed through viewership. Specifically, the relatively new use of videography as a means of recording and shaping life experience creates novel forms of personal narrative that function as social containers. Narratives of personal madness are seen to constitute the true residence of sanity.