Dial 'M' for Metonym: Universal Exports,M's Office Space and Empire

For James Bond, Britishness is most often realised outside the British Isles, within the old Empire. Whenever physically located in Britain proper, he is most likely to be found in the offices of Universal Exports otherwise known as the British Secret Service. M's office is a metonym for England, a stable point of departure for Bond's adventures, and a site from which to theorise the relationship between M (England) and Bond (Britain); ideology, iconography and office fittings; changes and challenges to that 'office space'; cognitive mapping and the resonance of a British signifier on the margins of empire.     

Telling and Re‐telling Stories: The Use of Narrative and Drawing in a Group Intervention with Parents and Children in a Remote Aboriginal Community

The Let's Start Parent‐Child Program is a manualised parent‐child program which aims to improve educational, social and emotional outcomes for Aboriginal parents and their four‐ to seven‐year‐old children. It has been implemented in the Northern Territory, Australia on the Tiwi Islands and in Darwin since 2005. This paper outlines the adaptation of the program to include narrative approaches, the sharing of stories and the use of expressive arts as a way to build understanding between program leaders and participating families. An example from a recent program is used to illustrate how the sharing of stories and expressive use of art engages and binds group participants together. It supports parents to tell their own stories, to speak about their lived experience, to reconsider aspects of their own and their children's experiences and to achieve an increased awareness of their personal resources and a sense of self‐empowerment. The program is designed and delivered with sensitivity to individual parents, children and families, where cultural and interpersonal differences and different developmental and family situations can be taken into account.     

Sociology and the Mix Tape: A Metaphor of Creativity

Creative endeavors often resemble one another. This paper explores similarities between sociology and art based on the use of conventions and creativity. More specifically, by comparing the construction of musical mix tapes, the author draws parallels between creating sociology and mix tapes. Looking at the process of how a mix tape is created using other artists’ songs and music for a specified purpose illuminates sociology and our roles as sociologists in a new light that leaves open new possibilities.     

Optimal Two‐Sided Invariant Similar Tests for Instrumental Variables Regression

This paper considers tests of the parameter on an endogenous variable in an instrumental variables regression model. The focus is on determining tests that have some optimal power properties. We start by considering a model with normally distributed errors and known error covariance matrix. We consider tests that are similar and satisfy a natural rotational invariance condition. We determine a two‐sided power envelope for invariant similar tests. This allows us to assess and compare the power properties of tests such as the conditional likelihood ratio (CLR), the Lagrange multiplier, and the Anderson–Rubin tests. We find that the CLR test is quite close to being uniformly most powerful invariant among a class of two‐sided tests. The finite‐sample results of the paper are extended to the case of unknown error covariance matrix and possibly nonnormal errors via weak instrument asymptotics. Strong instrument asymptotic results also are provided because we seek tests that perform well under both weak and strong instruments.     

Green grey hairs: A life course perspective on environmental engagement

ABSTRACT

Older adults provide a long view of understanding environmental engagement from their early beginnings to their current community activities. This study draws on interviews with self-described environmentalists and follows a life course analysis that employs social work values and practice skills as they work towards environmental justice in their Midwestern communities. We conclude that the older adults of this second generation of environmentalists offer valuable lessons for social workers with regard to environmental justice, while at the same time contributing insights into older adult volunteering and addressing the challenge of a generational gap in participation in their community organizations.     

A Comparison of Stimulus-Stimulus Pairing,Standard Echoic Training,and Control Procedures on the Vocal Behavior of Children With Autism

An alternating treatments design was employed to compare the effect of stimulus-stimulus pairing, standard echoic training, and a control condition on the vocal behavior of 3 preschoolers with autism. Data were recorded during pre- and postsession observations. During the stimulus-stimulus pairing condition, the experimenter''s vocal model was paired with the delivery of a preferred item. During the standard echoic training condition, the experimenter presented a vocal model and delivered a preferred item contingent on an echoic response. During the control condition, the experimenter presented a vocal model and, after a 10-s delay, presented a preferred edible item. Results from the post-session observations during the stimulus-stimulus pairing condition showed an immediate but temporary increase in the target sound for 1 participant only. Implications and suggestions for future research are provided.     

Central bank independence, economic freedom, and inflation rates

Measures of central bank independence combine many attributes that may or may not affect inflation. Central bank attributes are chosen as a result of political calculations over the distribution of resources between competing interest groups. Simultaneity bias results from regressions of central bank independence or of economic and political freedom on inflation or growth. Our estimates demonstrate the connections between economic and political freedom and central bank attributes that lead to inflation. Countries showing high degrees of economic freedom adopt structures that lead to lower inflation; those that show high degrees of political freedom do not adopt inflation-reducing institutional structures.     

Bayesian Interval Estimation for the Difference in TPRs and FPRs of Two Diagnostic Tests with Unverified Negatives

We derive Bayesian interval estimators for the differences in the true positive rates and false positive rates of two dichotomous diagnostic tests applied to the members of two distinct populations. The populations have varying disease prevalences with unverified negatives. We compare the performance of the Bayesian credible interval to the Wald interval using Monte Carlo simulation for a spectrum of different TPRs, FPRs, and sample sizes. For the case of a low TPR and low FPR, we found that a Bayesian credible interval with relatively noninformative priors performed well. We obtain similar interval comparison results for the cases of a high TPR and high FPR, a high TPR and low FPR, and of a high TPR and mixed FPR after incorporating mildly informative priors.