Beyond infant mortality: gender and stillbirth in reproductive mortality before the twentieth century

Though it has been the largest component of reproductive mortality since its statutory registration in 1928, stillbirth has received little attention from historical demographers, who have relied on the more orthodox indicator of early human survival changes - "infant mortality". The exclusion of stillbirth hampers demographic analysis, underestimates progress in newborn vitality, and over-privileges post-natal causes in theoretical explanation. A case is made for estimating stillbirth before 1928 as a ratio of early neonatal death, and for employing perinatal mortality as an historical indicator of female health status. The long-run trend of reproductive mortality (encompassing mature foetal and live born infant death during the first eleven months) reveals a substantial decline in perinatal causes in the first industrial century (1750-1850), implying a major concurrent improvement in the nutritional status of child bearers. Reproductive mortality is a more complete indicator of death in infancy. It offers demographers a means of fracturing the fertility versus mortality dualism and a potential purchase on gender as a demographic variable, while re-opening the case on mortality in the demographic dynamic of the world we have lost.     

Types of structural unemployment in the United Kingdom

The author assesses the importance of each classification of "structural unemployment, namely technological, mismatch of skills, geographical mismatch, demographic shifts, institutional rigidities, 'unemployability', and capital-restructuring unemployment." in the United Kingdom. He also reviews recent evidence on regional wage differential adjustments and their impact on the disequilibrium within the British labor market.     

Famine,Maternal Nutrition and Infant Mortality: A Re-examination of the Dutch Hunger Winter

During the Dutch Hunger Winter (1945), a unique, documented example of mass famine in an industrialized population, total reproductive loss (fetal and infant mortality) among most exposed mothers remained relatively low. This is explained by highly favourable fetal mortality and unfavourable infant mortality. The author traces the pattern of low fetal mortality to the higher levels of ‘embodied health status’ of famine mothers. The high infant mortality of the famine area testifies to the severity of the food and fuel shortage, yet another factor held down the rate of stillbirth. This other factor, it is argued, has a socio-economic character, it is the intrinsic ‘embodied’ nutritional status of the regional population, arising from favourable opportunities for growth and development among successive generations of mothers. This explanation highlights the importance of maternal vitality, (a synthetic, historically variable and culturally determined phenomenon) as a neglected feature of historical demography.     

Italian Preschoolers' Peer‐status Linkages with Sociability and Subtypes of Aggression and Victimization

Little is known about the behavior of preschool children belonging to peer sociometric status groups (popular, average, rejected, neglected, and controversial) in cultural contexts outside North America. This study examined the social interactions of Italian preschoolers. The sample consisted of 266 Italian preschoolers (mean age of 64 months). Physical and relational subtypes of aggression and victimization, as well as sociable behavior, were measured by peer nominations and teacher ratings. Peer nominations of acceptance and rejection (like and dislike nominations) were also collected in order to form the sociometric status groups. Results of confirmatory factor analyses showed that items developed with US preschoolers appeared to work fairly well in identifying behavioral constructs in Italian preschoolers. Findings generally supported previous research with American preschoolers. Sociometrically popular children were highest in sociability, and lowest in physical and relational aggression and victimization. The opposite pattern emerged for rejected status children. Neglected status children were generally not distinguished from average status children. Results also suggested that the enactment of relational aggression promotes greater social impact for some Italian children (controversial children), and this aggression also invites more conflict and victimization. However, the sociability of controversial children appears to buffer them from rejected group status.     

Bayesian Modeling of Measurement Errors and Pesticide Concentration in Dietary Risk Assessments

We propose new models for dealing with various sources of variability and uncertainty that influence risk assessments for dietary exposure. The uncertain or random variables involved can interact in complex ways, and the focus is on methodology for integrating their effects and on assessing the relative importance of including different uncertainty model components in the calculation of dietary exposures to contaminants, such as pesticide residues. The combined effect is reflected in the final inferences about the population of residues and subsequent exposure assessments. In particular, we show how measurement uncertainty can have a significant impact on results and discuss novel statistical options for modeling this uncertainty. The effect of measurement error is often ignored, perhaps due to the laboratory process conforming to the relevant international standards, for example, or is treated in an  ad hoc  way. These issues are common to many dietary risk analysis problems, and the methods could be applied to any food and chemical of interest. An example is presented using data on carbendazim in apples and consumption surveys of toddlers.     

Quantifying experts' uncertainty about the future cost of exotic diseases

Since the foot-and-mouth disease outbreak of 2001 in the United Kingdom, there has been debate about the sharing, between government and industry, both the costs of livestock disease outbreaks and responsibility for the decisions that give rise to them. As part of a consultation into the formation of a new body to manage livestock diseases, government veterinarians and economists produced estimates of the average annual costs for a number of exotic infectious diseases. In this article, we demonstrate how the government experts were helped to quantify their uncertainties about the cost estimates using formal expert elicitation techniques. This has enabled the decisionmakers to have a greater appreciation of government experts' uncertainty in this policy area.     

Trends in and determinants of outcomes in multi-union certification elections

We use data on 68,000 single-union and 3,600 multi-union elections during the years 1977–1994 to investigate factors influencing outcomes of multi-union elections. We find that, even though the win rate is much higher in multi-union as opposed to singleunion elections, the factors influencing the outcomes are surprisingly similar.