Demographic and Attitudinal Correlates of Employee Satisfaction with an ESOP

A firm's adoption of an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) has been hypothesized to increase employee productivity. Resulting employee productivity is hypothesized to improve firm profitability and thus ultimately improve stock performance. Most studies to date have tested potential relationships between the mere presence of an ESOP and changes in employee productivity and firm profitability. Few studies have attempted to identify the variables that are associated with employee satisfaction with an ESOP. In order to maximize the productivity gains associated with the adoption of an ESOP, researchers must first identify the relationships and variables most likely to positively affect employee attitudes and subsequently their satisfaction toward an ESOP. The purpose of this paper is to identify the demographic and attitudinal correlates of employee satisfaction with an ESOP. This exploration will provide a more substantive foundation for future research efforts in the area. Correlation and regression results indicated that employees' perceived influence on decision-making, perceived pay equity and perceived influence on stock performance, when examined separately, were each significant correlates of ESOP satisfaction. When combined with the modelled employee demographics in a step-wise regression model, only employees' perceived influence on stock performance, perceived influence on decision-making and age explained a statistically significant amount of variance in ESOP satisfaction.     

Generalized median graphs and applications

We study the so-called Generalized Median graph problem where the task is to construct a prototype (i.e., a ‘model’) from an input set of graphs. While our primary motivation comes from an important biological imaging application, the problem effectively captures many vision (e.g., object recognition) and learning problems, where graphs are increasingly being adopted as a powerful representation tool. Existing techniques for his problem are evolutionary search based; in this paper, we propose a polynomial time algorithm based on a linear programming formulation. We propose an additional algorithm based on a bi-level method to obtain solutions arbitrarily close to the optimal in (worst case) non-polynomial time. Within this new framework, one can optimize edit distance functions that capture similarity by considering vertex labels as well as he graph structure simultaneously. We first discuss experimental evaluations in context of molecular image analysis problems—he methods will provide the basis for building a topological map of all 23 pairs of the human chromosome. Later, we include (a) applications to other biomedical problems and (b) evaluations on a public pattern recognition graph database. This work was supported by NSF grants CCF-0546509, IIS-0713489, and NIH grant GM 072131-23. The second author was also supported in part by the Department of Biostatistics and Medical Informatics, UW-Madison and UW ICTR, funded through an NIH Clinical and Translational Science Award (CTSA), grant number 1 UL1 RR025011.     

Bootstrapping survival times in stochastic systems by using saddlepoint approximations

The single bootstrap is implemented by using a saddlepoint approximation to determine estimates for the survival and hazard functions of first-passage times in complicated semi-Markov processes. The double bootstrap is also implemented by resampling saddlepoint inversions and provides BC_a confidence bands for these functions. Confidence intervals for the mean and variance of first-passage times are easily computed. A new characterization of the asymptotic hazard rate for survival times is presented and leads to an indirect method for constructing its bootstrap confidence interval.     

Symbolic Interaction Theory and Architecture

Architectural sociology is receiving renewed attention but still remains a neglected area of investigation. As a major theoretical perspective within sociology, symbolic interaction helps us understand how the designed physical environment and the self are intertwined, with one potentially influencing and finding expression in the other; how architecture contains and communicates our shared symbols; and how we assign agency to some of our designed physical environment, which then invites in a different kind of self‐reflection. This article discusses numerous instances of symbolic interaction theory–architecture connections, with applied examples showing how symbolic interactionists and architects can collaborate on projects to the benefit of each, and to the benefit of humanity.     

Choice among behavior options: A methodology and an empiricial example

It is shown that certain core assumptions of the exchange approach can be translated into an algebraic form which is useful in interpreting empirical patterns of choice behavior. These assumptions include the premise that actors hold certain values which they perceive to be attainable in varying degrees by a series of alternative courses of action, and the premise that actors choose among alternative courses of action through a decision rule, which weighs the relative importance and optimal allocation of these values. The algebraic translation of these assumptions can represent the cognitive-evaluative structures used by actors, thereby providing a series of insights into the value dimensions used in choosing among these behavior options. This methodology departs from the analytic procedures of experimental social psychologi by explicitly creating a geometric repressentation of cognitive structure. This representation can be interpreted by mapping independent value rating scales into the space. Coordinates of the space, finally, can be used as dependent variables in conventional multivariate analyses, to study the determinants of individual variation in value orientation.     

Using the studentized range to assess kurtosis

Because it is easy to compute from three common statistics (minimum, maximum, standard deviation) the studentized range is a useful test for non-normality when the original data are unavailable. For samples from symmetric populations, the studentized range allows an assessment of kurtosis with Type I and II error rates similar to those obtained from the moment coefficients.     

Death and Taxes: Longer life, consumption, and social security

We analyze in three steps the influence of the projected mortality decline on the long run finances of the Social Security System. First, on a theoretical level, mortality decline adds person years of life which are distributed across the life cycle. The interaction of this distribution with the age distribution of labor earnings minus consumption, or of taxes minus benefits, partially determines the corresponding steady state financial consequences of mortality decline. The effect of mortality decline on population growth rates also matters, but is negligible in low mortality populations. Second, examination of past mortality trends in the United States and of international trends in low mortality populations, suggests that mortality will decline faster than foreseen by the Social Security Administration s forecasts. Third, we combine the work of the first two parts in dynamic simulations to examine the implications of mortality decline and of alternative forecasts of mortality for the finances of the social security system. Also, we use stochastic population forecasts to assess the influence of uncertainty about mortality decline on uncertainty about finances; we find that uncertainty about fertility still has more important implications than uncertainty about mortality, contrary to sensitivity tests in the official forecasts.