The Catalonia survey: Personality and intelligence structure in a sample of compulsive gamblers

A sample of fifty-seven pathological gamblers and one hundred and fifteen controls (two per pathological gambler, matched as regards age and sex) was investigated. This sample received a complex battery of psychometric tests designed to evaluate two different axes: psychopathology and intelligence. The results obtained show that pathological gamblers have an unstable family and work background, that pathological gambling correlates with other addictions (alcohol, illness prone behavior, absenteeism, risk working, living alone and bereavement), that all the general and specific psychopathology vectors were significant in the addicts, and that the pathological gamblers' intelligence has characteristic factors.We thank Ricardo Cayuela (Line Staff, Barcelona) for his help in collecting the sample; Jordi Daura for data processing work; Mercedes Lemonier, psychologist, for her help in administering and correcting the tests; Consol Marina and Teresa Ruiz for their secretarial assistance and contact with the 172 study subjects.     

The role of mediatory myths in sustaining ideology: the case of Cuba after the ‘special period’

After the collapse of the Soviet bloc, management researchers devoted considerable energy to investigating ways to operate the transition to market economies. However, one country of the former Soviet bloc, Cuba, resisted transition and reaffirmed loyalty to the values of La Revolucion. Little is known about management in Cuba. This study seeks to approach one particular aspect of management in this country: the relationship between national ideology and management practice. To analyse the topic, qualitative data from Cuban managers and management professors were gathered over a 10‐year period. Results suggest that the dynamics of managerial ideology can be understood as the interplay of several processes operating at distinct levels: institutional, professional, organizational and individual. The interplay between conformance to the ideology and its use as a practical resource is a potential source of change and of conflict demands that are tackled with recourse to mediatory myths.     

Sexual place,spatial change,and the social reorganization of sexual culture

This paper describes how the landscape of a public place in a New York City park embodies larger external structures within which sexual subjects actively organize local sexual culture. Controlling the configuration and utilization of such space is a technique of power used by the state apparatus. Based upon ethnographic fieldwork, we describe how the sexual culture situated within this public space is produced and reproduced in the micro‐social practices of sexual subjects in the face of structural constraints. The social reorganization of sexuality occurs when subjects creatively refashion their local sexual culture through subtle alterations in the way they practice it. Such practical alterations occur in dialogue with larger structures. Ultimately, this analysis of sexual space in San Jose Park provides for an examination of the deployment of power and local sexual culture as the nexus of structure and agency.     

La participación en los grupos sociales: elaboración de un sistema mediante ordenador para su análisis y control (A.C.P.)

Resumen

La finalidad de este informe es proporcionar datos sobre un nuevo instrumento para la observación de grupos y posibles aplicaciones.     

A characterization of the single-peaked domain

We provide in this paper two properties that are both necessary and sufficient to characterize the domain of single-peaked preference profiles. This characterization allows for a definition of single-peaked preference profiles without using an ad hoc underlying order of the alternatives and also sheds light on the structure of single-peaked profiles. Considering the larger domain of value-restricted preference profiles (Sen, Econometrica 34:491–499, 1966) we also provide necessary and sufficient conditions for a preference profile to be single-caved or group-separable. Our results show that for single-peaked, single-caved and group-separable profiles it is sufficient to restrict to profiles containing of either three individuals and three alternatives or two individuals and four alternatives.     

A pilot study of Latinos with multiple sclerosis: demographic, disease, mental health, and psychosocial characteristics

In this study the authors present results from a survey of 99 Latinos with multiple sclerosis (MS), including demographic, disease, and mental health characteristics. Four in 10 respondents reported depressive symptoms; half thought they had more worries than other people due to their MS; and about 29?% thought they needed mental health care in the past year. Whereas 76?% of respondents were highly satisfied with their access to MS-focused care, only 61% were highly satisfied with their access to mental health care. These findings highlight the role of mental health and social services in the comprehensive care needed by Latinos with MS.     

The Relationship Between Social Support, Loneliness, and Subjective Well-Being in a Spanish Sample from a Multidimensional Perspective

The aim of this study was to investigate the association between social support, loneliness and well-being from a multidimensional perspective for which two structural models are proposed. The study included 2042 participants from Malaga City (Spain) who were aged between 18 and 95 years. For the dimensions frequency of support and satisfaction with support, the results show that partner support, family support, and support from friends, respectively, significantly decrease romantic loneliness, family loneliness, and social loneliness. On the other hand, community support has little effect on reducing social loneliness. Of the three types of support analyzed (emotional, informational and instrumental), emotional support was significantly more effective in reducing loneliness (family, romantic and social) and increasing well-being. Loneliness partially acts as a mediator variable, although it is affected by social support, but at the same time decreases the effects of social support on subjective well-being. The three types of loneliness have a strong negative impact on subjective well-being. Implications of these results are discussed.     

On the effects of public and private transfers on capital accumulation: some lessons from the NTA aggregates

Intergenerational transfers are a very important part of our daily economic activity. These transfers, whether familial or public, may influence our economic decisions to the same extent that financial markets do. In this paper, we seek to shed some light on the effects of transfers on capital accumulation in the face of demographic aging. In particular, a general equilibrium overlapping generations model with realistic public and familial transfers drawn from the National Transfer Accounts project is implemented to Spain. Given that, in this case, net familial transfers mainly go from parents to children while public transfers go from children to parents, it is shown that the Spanish baby boom and baby bust could lead to capital depletion and a reduction in consumption per capita.     

SHOCKING STUFF: TECHNOLOGY,HOURS, AND FACTOR SUBSTITUTION

The response of hours to technology shocks is a key controversy in macroeconomics. We show that differences between RBC and NK models hinge on highly restrictive views of technology. We introduce CES production technologies and demonstrate that the response of hours depends on the factor‐augmenting nature of shocks and the capital–labor substitution elasticity in both models. We develop analytical expressions to establish the thresholds determining its sign. This opens new margins for shock identification combining theory and VAR evidence. We discuss how our models provide new robust restrictions for empirical work, especially using the labor income share.