Improving Weight of Evidence Approaches to Chemical Evaluations

Federal and other regulatory agencies often use or claim to use a weight of evidence (WoE) approach in chemical evaluation. Their approaches to the use of WoE, however, differ significantly, rely heavily on subjective professional judgment, and merit improvement. We review uses of WoE approaches in key articles in the peer‐reviewed scientific literature, and find significant variations. We find that a hypothesis‐based WoE approach, developed by Lorenz Rhomberg et al., can provide a stronger scientific basis for chemical assessment while improving transparency and preserving the appropriate scope of professional judgment. Their approach, while still evolving, relies on the explicit specification of the hypothesized basis for using the information at hand to infer the ability of an agent to cause human health impacts or, more broadly, affect other endpoints of concern. We describe and endorse such a hypothesis‐based WoE approach to chemical evaluation.     

Managing Quality in a Heterogeneous Contract Manufacturing Environment

The outsourcing of production is a prominent strategy across industries. While the strategy can have many benefits, the popular press reports numerous examples of quality issues originating with contract manufacturers (CMs). Observing these quality issues, multiple scholars call for the quality management (QM) literature to be extended to explicitly address the challenges of managing quality in an inter‐organizational context. Additionally, QM researchers recognize the need to consider contextual contingencies for the effectiveness of specific QM practices. Responding to these calls, we focus on the potential contingent factor of CM heterogeneity (i.e. the degree of product and process diversity at the CM plant). We first test the direct relationship between CM manufacturing heterogeneity and CM quality conformance performance, as reported by the CM's customers, brand‐owning firms. Next, we evaluate the effectiveness of multiple practices that these brand‐owning firms can employ to mitigate the anticipated negative effect of heterogeneity on their CM's conformance quality. We utilize paired dyadic data on 106 contract manufacturing relationships in the food, drug, and medical device industries to test our hypothesized model. The results of our analysis reveal a negative association between heterogeneity at CM facilities and their conformance quality performance. Our results also identify cooperative relationships, contractual coordination provisions, and formal performance assessment programs as practices that brand‐owning firms can employ to largely eliminate the negative impact of heterogeneity on CMs’ conformance quality performance.     

Individual Differences in Women's Salivary Testosterone and Estradiol Following Sexual Activity in a Nonlaboratory Setting

Objectives: The current study evaluated women's salivary testosterone and estradiol levels before and after exposure to sexual stimuli in a U.S. sex club. Methods: Behavioral data and salivary samples were collected from 19 women during semistructured interviews. Results: Findings demonstrate substantial individual differences in the magnitude and direction of women's hormonal changes following sexual activity. Conclusions: In an age of individualized medicine, these findings highlight the need to better understand factors shaping variation in physiological responses to sexual activity. Findings contribute to a relatively small and contradictory literature on women's hormonal responses to sexual stimuli.     

PREDICTORS OF STRESS AMONG AUSTRALIAN FARMERS

Australian farms continue to suffer economic pressure which directly and indirectly produces stress among farm family members. This study uses qualitative and quantitative data to isolate factors which predict stress, Financial condition, perception of what is at stake, the combination of on-farm and off-farm obligations and the general frustrations of farm life are found to predict stress among both men and women. Gender relations and attachment to farm life emerge as stronger predictors for women, while youth is a stronger predictor for men. The study concludes that attempts to develop and preserve the family farm may be creating stressful situations which threaten the family relations upon which the farming system is based.     

Heterogeneous climate effects on human migration in Indonesia

We examine the effect of anomalous temperatures, rainfall levels, and monsoon timing on migration outcomes in Indonesia. Using panel data from the Indonesian Family Life Survey and high-resolution climate data, we assess whether intra- and inter-province moves are used as a response to climatic shocks. We evaluate the relative importance of temperature, rainfall, and monsoon timing for migration. Only temperature and monsoon timing have significant effects, and these do not operate in the direction commonly assumed. Estimated effects vary according to individuals’ gender, membership in a farm household, and location. We also analyze climate effects on sources of household income, which highlights the multi-phasic nature of household responses. Results undermine narratives of a uniform global migratory response to climate change and highlight the heterogeneous use of migration as a response to such changes. By extending previous research on environmentally induced migration in Indonesia, we also highlight the sensitivity of estimates to alternative climate and migration measures.     

Childbearing Across Partnerships in Australia,the United States,Norway, and Sweden

This article compares mothers’ experience of having children with more than one partner in two liberal welfare regimes (the United States and Australia) and two social democratic regimes (Sweden and Norway). We use survey-based union and birth histories in Australia and the United States and data from national population registers in Norway and Sweden to estimate the likelihood of experiencing childbearing across partnerships at any point in the childbearing career. We find that births with new partners constitute a substantial proportion of all births in each country we study. Despite quite different arrangements for social welfare, the determinants of childbearing across partnerships are very similar. Women who had their first birth at a very young age or who are less well-educated are most likely to have children with different partners. The educational gradient in childbearing across partnerships is also consistently negative across countries, particularly in contrast to educational gradients in childbearing with the same partner. The risk of childbearing across partnerships increased dramatically in all countries from the 1980s to the 2000s, and educational differences also increased, again, in both liberal and social democratic welfare regimes.