Modeling Electricity Price Using A Threshold Conditional Autoregressive Geometric Process Jump Model

Electricity market prices are highly volatile and often have high spikes. Both government authorities and market participants require sophisticated models and techniques for forecasting future prices and managing relevant financial risks in such a volatile market. This article extends the conditional autoregressive geometric process (CARGP) model (Chan et al., 2012 Chan, J. S.K., Lam, C. P.Y., Yu, P. L.H., Choy, S. T.B., Chen, C. W.S. (2012). A Bayesian conditional autoregressive geometric process model for range data. Computat. Statist. Data Anal. 56:30063019.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) to the CARGP model with thresholds and jumps, which is abbreviated as CARGP-TJ model in this article. We will demonstrate that the proposed CARGP-TJ model not only captures the unique features of the electricity price but also performs better than other existing models. For robustness consideration, a heavy-tailed error distribution is adopted. Model implementation relies on the powerful Bayesian Markov chain Monte Carlo simulation techniques via WinBUGS software. The analysis of the daily maximum electricity prices of the New South Wales, Australia reveals that the proposed CARGP-TJ model captures the price spikes well for both in-sample estimation and out-of-sample forecast.     

Hear No Evil, See No Evil? Associations of Gender, Trauma History, and Values with Believing Trauma Vignettes

Attitudes and beliefs about sexual assault in general influence judgments about the veracity of specific sexual assault reports and disclosures ( Taylor, 2007 ). The present study investigated the impact of gender, personal trauma history, and beliefs about gender and child sexual abuse (CSA) on judgments of the veracity of CSA disclosures. The study also examined judgments about other kinds of trauma disclosures using a variety of different types of trauma vignettes. Men were found to be more skeptical than women, and those who reported no trauma history were less likely than those who reported a trauma history to believe disclosures. Overall, all participants were more skeptical about CSA disclosures than disclosures about other kinds of trauma. Sexism and belief in CSA myths (CSAMs) were negatively related to believing adults' retrospective CSA disclosures. In a series of regression analyses, we observed that belief in CSAMs moderated the negative association between sexist attitudes and believing disclosures. Implications for educating professionals are discussed .     

Minimizing Social Desirability Bias in Measuring Sensitive Topics: The Use of Forgiving Language in Item Development

Abstract

Social science research has long been concerned with attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors that are potentially objectionable, immoral, or illegal. These types of topics include, for example, racism, ableism, cheating, and stealing, among others. Referred to as “sensitive topics,” their investigation usually involves questions that require respondents to admit to attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors that violate social norms, making their assessment susceptible to error due to social desirability bias. This article describes an empirical investigation of an approach to minimize this bias, the use of “forgiving language” in survey item development and the effect on item variability. Using secondary data initially collected as part of a measurement development study of mental health providers’ stigmatization of service users, 15 pairs of similar, thematically targeted items, varying with respect to wording approach were tested using a purposive sample of mental health providers (N?=?220). Findings indicate that items crafted in a forgiving manner were not significantly influenced by social desirability bias, in contrast to items developed in more traditional language. Additionally, forgiving language-items produced higher levels of agreement, on average, when compared to those written in more traditional language. More research is indicated, including systematic variation of wording approaches, but these results seem promising.     

Negotiating the "state of exception": Gypsies' encounter with the judiciary in Germany and Italy, 1860-1914

The tensions between judicial and executive authorities regarding so-called Gypsies in fin de siècle Germany and Italy reveals an inherent contradiction between the universalist dictates of the modern Rechtsstaat and the requirements of building a national state free of perceived outsiders. The frustration of executive authorities with judicial authorities who insisted on protecting the universalist individual enshrined in law pushed executive authorities to utilize the 'state of exception' to achieve their vision of the national community. Rather than choosing to create illiberal laws that would expressly exclude Gypsies from the national body, and would resolve the tension with the judiciary, authorities in Germany and Italy instead chose to go around the law by treating Gypsies as an exception not subject to the law. The state of exception not only deprived those labelled as Gypsies of a method of resistance, since many were able to use unwilling courts to protect them from over-zealous executive authorities, but also created a group of stateless people, persecuted and lacking basic human rights.     

The Significance of Education for Mortality Compression in the United States

Recent studies of old-age mortality trends assess whether longevity improvements over time are linked to increasing compression of mortality at advanced ages. The historical backdrop of these studies is the long-term improvement in a population's socioeconomic resources that fueled longevity gains. We extend this line of inquiry by examining whether socioeconomic differences in longevity within a population are accompanied by old-age mortality compression. Specifically, we document educational differences in longevity and mortality compression for older men and women in the United States. Drawing on the fundamental cause of disease framework, we hypothesize that both longevity and compression increase with higher levels of education and that women with the highest levels of education will exhibit the greatest degree of longevity and compression. Results based on the Health and Retirement Study and the National Health Interview Survey Linked Mortality File confirm a strong educational gradient in both longevity and mortality compression. We also find that mortality is more compressed within educational groups among women than men. The results suggest that educational attainment in the United States maximizes life chances by delaying the biological aging process.     

Mortality From the Influenza Pandemic of 1918–1919: The Case of India

Estimates of worldwide mortality from the influenza pandemic of 1918-1919 vary widely, from 15 million to 100 million. In terms of loss of life, India was the focal point of this profound demographic event. In this article, we calculate mortality from the influenza pandemic in India using panel data models and data from the Census of India. The new estimates suggest that for the districts included in the sample, mortality was at most 13.88 million, compared with 17.21 million when calculated using the assumptions of Davis (1951). We conclude that Davis' influential estimate of mortality from influenza in British India is overstated by at least 24%. Future analyses of the effects of the pandemic on demographic change in India and worldwide will need to account for this significant downward revision.