Multistate projections by level of education for Portugal, 2011–2031

Educational attainment is an attribute that leads to a great distinction between the members of a population, including when considering their health and well-being, which are features to pursue within an aging society. The aim of this work was to produce demographic projections for the Portuguese population by sex, age group and level of educational attainment, for the period 2011–2031. Considering fertility, mortality and migration differentials by level of education, the population was projected using the multistate cohort-component method with a block Leslie matrix. Two scenarios were considered, one where educational attainment before 2011 remains constant and another in which educational attainment will follow the trend observed over the last decade, being the trend in the state proportion modelled using continuation ratio models. The results show an increase in the proportion of individuals who complete higher educational levels in almost all age groups of both sexes. Among women, only 13.6 % had completed some level of higher education in 2011, a figure that will rise to approximately 23.4 % in 2031, whereas among men this value was only 9.7 % and will also rise by 2031, reaching 15.5 %. We can expect the proportion of people with higher educational levels to continue to rise as the education of younger cohorts seems to evolve positively. This work will be particularly useful to study how the aging population and the rising levels of education can contribute to the planning and monitoring of public policies, although these findings can also be used in other research contexts.     

Family Structure and Subjective Economic Well-Being: Some New Evidence

The paper investigates the main socio-demographic and economic determinants of subjective economic well-being in different typologies of households. Previous studies have used dummy variables to explore the effect of family structure. In this paper, however four different models—one for each family typology—have been estimated to test if each selected explanatory variable is significant and how it acts in determining the level of subjective economic well-being. To achieve this, we apply an under-used logit model—the partial proportional ordered model. Our analysis, based on data from the 2005 Italian Survey on Income and Living Conditions highlights the main variables affecting the subjective economic well-being of all household typologies. These main variables are related to income adequacy, such as being able to afford housing, clothes and holidays, and also include the work-status and level of education of the respondent. These variables produce notable differences in the level of subjective economic well-being. We find that couples with no children have the highest level of perceived economic well-being, while couples with two or more children and even more so one-person households are more economically insecure.     

Deciding to use the emergency room: a qualitative survey of older veterans

Increasing use in the past decade has created pressure for hospital emergency rooms (ERs). Healthcare provided through an ER is expensive and is not designed to meet the complex needs of an older, chronically-ill population. ER visits are presented as the outcome of a decision-making process. Thirty veterans who had visited the ER in the previous year were asked about their decisions to use the ER. Their responses reflected four distinct approaches to ER use, which are characterized by frequency (frequent/infrequent) and risk for social isolation (low/high). Appropriate interventions by social work personnel might reduce inappropriate use of the ER and enhance the care of this vulnerable population.     

Gender inequalities in European unemployment benefit systems

The most important structural change which has occurred on the labour market over the past 30 years is the sustained and continued growth of female labour supply. Two-earner couples have become a majority in most European countries and lone parents, mostly women, are also on the rise. On the other hand, since 1975, labour market policies have altered the quality and nature of employment in Europe by promoting atypical forms of employment where women are overrepresented. The analysis has shown us that atypical employment results in restricted access to unemployment benefits. Moreover, combining the presence of more stringent conditions with derived rights results in more and more women being dependent upon their spouses for financial as well as social protection and can even have a disincentive effect on formal labour market participation.     

Eating Its Own: The Whistleblower's Organization in Vendetta Mode

This paper reports on Australia's largest whistleblower study. Specifically it focuses on the experiences of whistleblowers in the Queensland public sector during the Goss Labor government's first term. Rather than being affirmed as good citizen-workers when they took disclosures of wrongdoing to their supervisors within the units in which they worked, the whistleblowers encountered obstruction and vilification. Their experiences offer a rare check-up on the state of workplace dissent.     

Epidemical spread of scientific objects: An attempt of empirical approach to some problems of meta-science

The paper deals with problems of prediction of spreading out of scientific objects, such as theories, hypotheses, methods etc. Two models for predicting changes in number of publications dealing with the given subjects in consecutive years are suggested; these models are based on the theory of epidemics.     

Beyond Employment Rate: A Multidimensional Indicator of Higher Education Effectiveness

This paper proposes a multidimensional indicator of higher education effectiveness that aims at going beyond the limits of measuring university effectiveness merely through employment rates. The units of analysis are the study programmes. Eleven indicators related to external effectiveness are selected, and their reliability for and relevance to the representation of the concept of effectiveness are empirically evaluated. The data are drawn from a longitudinal survey administered to graduates of the University of Padua, Italy, from 2008 to 2011. From our analyses, effectiveness appears to be a multidimensional concept composed by professional empowerment, employability and personal fulfilment. The right time for collecting relevant data on educational outcomes varies according to the types of indicators: indicators of professional empowerment assessed 1 year after graduation are most suitable, while for personal fulfilment measurement both short- and long-term evaluation are relevant, and, for employability, data collected 3 years after graduation cannot discriminate among study programmes.     

Analysis of Cultural Indicators: A Comparison of Their Conceptual Basis and Dimensions

Multiple organizations and institutions have been resorting to indicators on diverse aspects of culture (e.g., creativity, social cohesion, cultural vitality, economic participation), according to their particular purposes and views of what is to be measured. This paper presents results from a research report of a qualitative study that analyzed 35 papers on cultural indicators found via Internet, based on four categories: purpose, assumptions about culture, concept of culture they sustain, and dimensions of indicators considered. Results show that even when the importance of culture is widely recognized in the papers, most of them propose indicators without having solid theoretical foundations, and with an emphasis on the relation between culture and economy. Also, most of the documents do not have a definition of culture or present an instrumental conceptualization of it, where culture is valued not as an end in itself but as a resource than can serve to development.     

The Satisfaction with Sex Life Across the Adult Life Span

Three separate issues concerning the relation between age and satisfaction with sex life are addressed in this article. The first issue was concerned with the age generalizability of the factor structure produced by responses to the Satisfaction with Sex Life Scale (SWSLS). The second issue was to examine whether there were differences in the satisfaction with sex life according to certain background characteristics, namely age. Finally, the relationship between scores on the SWSLS with those on other relational constructs was explored. Data collection involved completion of a questionnaire. The sample consisted of 1,144 participants. The mean ages of the sample were 38.99 years in (SD = 16.91); ages ranged from 20 to 80. The data indicated that the factor structure of responses to the SWSLS were highly similar through adult life. Religious involvement, marital status, and love status influenced satisfaction with sex life. Expected correlations with measures of other relationship constructs were found. The strongest predictor of satisfaction with sex live across the adult life span was love satisfaction. Suggestions concerning the use of the SWSLS for research and clinical purposes are offered.