Predicting infectious disease outbreak risk via migratory waterfowl vectors

The spread of an emerging infectious disease is a major public health threat. Given the uncertainties associated with vector-borne diseases, in terms of vector dynamics and disease transmission, it is critical to develop statistical models that address how and when such an infectious disease could spread throughout a region such as the USA. This paper considers a spatio-temporal statistical model for how an infectious disease could be carried into the USA by migratory waterfowl vectors during their seasonal migration and, ultimately, the risk of transmission of such a disease to domestic fowl. Modeling spatio-temporal data of this type is inherently difficult given the uncertainty associated with observations, complexity of the dynamics, high dimensionality of the underlying process, and the presence of excessive zeros. In particular, the spatio-temporal dynamics of the waterfowl migration are developed by way of a two-tiered functional temporal and spatial dimension reduction procedure that captures spatial and seasonal trends, as well as regional dynamics. Furthermore, the model relates the migration to a population of poultry farms that are known to be susceptible to such diseases, and is one of the possible avenues toward transmission to domestic poultry and humans. The result is a predictive distribution of those counties containing poultry farms that are at the greatest risk of having the infectious disease infiltrate their flocks assuming that the migratory population was infected. The model naturally fits into the hierarchical Bayesian framework.     

Vocational education,self‐employment and burnout among Australian workers

We examine the relationship between vocational education and occupational burnout among workers in different forms of employment. Although the self‐employed enjoy higher levels of job autonomy and work‐related satisfaction, we do not know whether they experience lower rates of occupational burnout, and whether vocational education plays a role in this relationship. This latter consideration is important, given that vocational qualifications often lead to self‐employment and prior research demonstrated that formal training may reduce burnout. However, formal education was previously measured in years of schooling, without considering the distinction between academically‐oriented and vocational courses. Therefore, using data from a 2001 national survey of working Australians, we first establish that the self‐employed are significantly less likely to experience burnout. We then demonstrate that some resilience to burnout can be attributed to the attainment of skilled vocational training, net of employment characteristics which are also very important.     

Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Bipolar Disorder: Implications for Clinical Social Workers

ABSTRACT

The purposes of this review article are to orient clinical social workers to cognitive-behavioral theory, intervention, and research on bipolar disorder (BD); identify pros and cons of applying cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) to social work clients with BD; and identify specific implications for clinical social work practice. Of the 545 articles that were obtained via the systematic review, 18 studies were identified as being potentially eligible for inclusion, and 9 of those studies ultimately satisfied the inclusion criteria. The results of each study were summarized via identifying statistically significant (p< .05) differences that existed between experimental cohorts who received CBT (plus pharmacotherapy) and control cohorts who received treatment as usual. Outcomes showed CBT cohorts as having significant improvement over their respective control groups. The review's implications for clinical social workers and the need for future research are discussed.     

The numerical evaluation of the distribution function of a bilinear from to a quadratic from with econometric examples

This paper considers a general and computationally convenient method of evaluating the distribution function of statistics that are the ratio of a bilinear form to a quadratic form. Numerous Economemc applications of the method are given.     

The recruitment and selection of hospital medical consultants

Abstract

The literature on selection has been dominated in recent decades by the ‘prediction’ paradigm. Such an approach requires a substantial number of positions to be filled in order to compute validity coefficients. There are other approaches, using a different paradigm, when concentrated on adjusting the organization and the employee. Here careful analysis of job demands is essential. This article describes such an analysis, taking the medical consultant as an example. The method can be used in an iterative way. It is useful when one has to work with small numbers of positions.     

A note on approximate confidence limits for the negative binomial model

Four methods of approximating confidence limits for the single negative binomial parameter, P, are outlined and an empirical study is presented. Some remarks on prediction intervals are also included.     

A Diagnostic Test for Normality Within the Power Exponential Family

This article develops the locally uniformly most powerful unbiased Lagrange multiplier test of normality of regression disturbances within the family of power exponential distributions. The small sample power properties of the test are compared in a Monte Carlo study with 6 well-known tests across 12 alternative nonnormal distributions. In addition, the finite sample power properties for nonnormal alternatives within the power exponential family are summarized by estimating response surfaces. The results suggest that the proposed text is computationally convenient and possesses relatively attractive power properties even against alternatives outside the power exponential family.     

From the Editor

No abstract available for this article.     

A Diamond-Stiglitz approach to the demand for self-protection

The existing research concerning the relationship between risk aversion and prudence and the demand for self-protection assumes that the loss variable follows a Bernoulli distribution, and that changes in the level of self-protection are mean preserving. The analysis here replaces these two very strong conditions with ones which are more general. When doing this, the method of analysis is also significantly modified. This modification includes representing a change in the level of self-protection using the procedure developed by Diamond and Stiglitz (Journal of Economic Theory 8:337-360, 1974) for representing a change in risk. This alternate representation allows the existing findings to be generalized considerably, and also simplifies the analysis.