The Organizational Demography of Japanese Environmentalism*

Although a macro‐organizational perspective has become increasingly commonplace in social movement analyses, few studies examine the full spectrum of organizations in any single social movement industry (SMI). Utilizing a unique source of data on Japanese environmental movement organizations, we compare characteristics of groups focused primarily on environmental issues with those for whom environmental issues are part of a larger multi‐issue focus. We then profile across distinct, and theoretically important, organizational domains to assess how local, prefectural and national groups compare on a variety of organizational attributes, including: size, membership type, tactics and activities, and issues. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for understanding both Japanese environmentalism and the structure of SMIs generally.     

Effects of Customized Balance Exercises on Older Women Whose Balance Ability Has Deteriorated With Age

Falls represent a major public health problem for older adults, and loss of balance (LOS) abilities is one of the primary causes of falls. Previous studies have shown that balance training is effective in improving physical function and decreasing risk of falls. However, little attention has been given specifically to balance training in older adults with very poor balance. The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of a 12-week customized balance exercise program on LOS for community-dwelling older women with poor balance ability. Twenty-four older women with poor balance (composite maximum excursion [MXEcomp] score of less than 70% based on Limits of Stability) were divided into an exercise group and control group. After 12 weeks of balance exercises, mean MXEcomp improved (p < .05) from 58.6% to 79.0% in the exercise group. EPEcomp (composite endpoint excursion), RTcomp (composite reaction time), SVcomp3 (composite sway velocity on thick foam with the eyes open), UG (up and go) also improved, but the functional reach and other static balance indexes did not change. These results indicated that balance training allows older adults with poor balance to improve dynamic balance ability and potentially reduce risk for falls.     

Two-stage procedures for the difference of two multinormal means with covariance matrices different only by unknown scalar multipliers

We consider the problem of constructing a fixed-size confidence region for the difference of means of two multivariate normal populations It is assumed that the variance-covariance matrices of two populations are different only by unknown scalar multipliers Two-stage procedures are presented to derive such a confidence region We also discuss the asymptotic efficiency of the procedure.     

Gasoline Cost and Hedonic Price Indexes of U.S. Used Cars for 1970–1983 A Note

Hedonic price indexes are estimated for U.S. used passenger cars for 1970–1983. A few notions of indexes that differ in the treatments of the expected present value of gasoline cost for driving a car over its remaining life are considered. Their relationships are obtained theoretically and examined empirically. Our indexes also are compared with the Consumer Price Index.     

Approximately Median-Unbiased Estimation of Autoregressive Models

A hedonic model of automobile prices that takes gasoline costs into account is developed and used to examine whether gasoline price increases (especially those related to the 1973 and 1979 oil shocks) changed consumer evaluations of the relative qualities of used cars in the U.S. during 1970–1981. We test the null hypothesis that the characteristics' coefficients remained constant over time. It is rejected if gasoline costs are excluded from the model but not if they are included. Alternative approaches are developed to show that the gasoline price increases alone can explain much of the observed changes in the coefficients.     

Evaluating the Quality of Online Survey Data Collected in 2018 in the USA: Univariate,Bivariate, and Multivariate Analyses

Collecting survey data in Japan and the USA is difficult for many reasons, including the difficulty of creating complete sampling frames and low response rates. Online surveys, which collect data through online access panels and recruit members using nonprobability sampling, is becoming a popular alternative to traditional survey techniques, both in market and social science research. However, sociological researchers are hesitant to adopt online survey data collection techniques as it is unclear how representative such data are. This article examines the quality of online survey data by comparing online surveys with the two datasets collected using probability sampling, the American Community Survey and the General Social Survey. We conducted univariate, bivariate, and multivariate analyses and investigated whether similarities improve from the univariate analyses to bivariate relationships, and to bivariate relationships with controls. The results show that similarities improved from univariate to bivariate and multivariate analyses, but the results of bivariate and multivariate analyses did not differ. We concluded that data collected via volunteer‐based access panels yielded similar results to the benchmark data, especially when the relationships among variables are examined. We argue that automatically discrediting the data collected via volunteer‐based access panels is not good practice. With careful considerations of data quality, online survey data with nonprobability sampling could advance sociological research by giving researchers more freedom to ask questions at a relatively low cost, with a quick turnaround time, and more opportunities to conduct cross‐national research.     

A Comment on “Can Relaxation of Beliefs Rationalize the Winner's Curse?: An Experimental Study”

Ivanov, Levin, and Niederle (2010) use a common‐value second‐price auction experiment to reject beliefs‐based explanations for the winner's curse. ILN's conclusion, however, stems from the misuse of theoretical arguments. Beliefs‐based models are even compatible with some observations from ILN's experiment.     

The adaptive significance of leaf-mining pattern as an anti-parasitoid strategy: A theoretical study

Summary An adaptive significance of linear leaf mining patterns as the anti-parasitoid strategy is theoretically analysed. In the model, a leaf-miner is allowed to move in one of four ways; mining ahead in unexploited area of a leaf, backtracking, branching off from the backtracking mine, and crossing the previous mine. The model parasitoid searches for the leaf-miner by tracing the mine by the tactile cue of mine surface after detecting the mine. The average duration from detecting the mine to finding the leaf-miner host is calculated for various patterns of mining, changing numbers of branches and of crosses. This average duration becomes longer when the leaf-miner stays near either end of the mine compared with when staying near its center. It is also prolonged as the numbers of branches and of crosses increase.     

三代中国缘 代代中国情

我叫市川真,说起我家三代人与中国的缘分,与许多日本老百姓家庭一样,也没有什么特别的。日本和中国这邻邦靠得太近,你打哈欠我就着凉,我咳嗽你就发烧,关系如此密切,大家都和中国有或深或浅的缘分。和平年代还好些,可以从中享受,战争年代就苦了,大家颇受磨难。我父亲那辈是个不幸的年代,负面的话题不胜枚举,有些事情不好写或者不宜写。     

Relation between exploitation and production in experimental populations ofPoecilia reticulata

Summary In order to make researches on the effect of exploitation upon fish populations, six populations of guppy were maintained during a period of 331 weeks under conditions of space, light, temperature, pH, and food controlled as much as possible. The six populations were divided into three groups two by two: a control group without exploitation, a 10% rate of exploitation group and a 20 and 33% rate of exploitation group. All the populations repeated an increase and a decrease in number and in biomass about once a year. The exploitation affected the age composition in the populations: in the non-exploited population adults occupied the largest part, and the more intensive the exploitation the larger the part fry occupied. The exploitation decreased the biomass of exploited populations, but productivity increased with increasing of of rate of exploitation. The relationship between adult and fry could be represented byRicker's reproduction curve. The form of the curve was changed by an intensity of exploitation. It was thought that exploitation acts as a preventer of aging of populations by removing old fish and results increasing number of fry and productivity.