Spatial Statistics for Dyadic Data: Analyzing the Relationship Landscape

Spatial statistics has a rich tradition in earth, economic, and epidemiological sciences and has potential to affect the study of couples as well. When applied to couple data, spatial statistics can model within‐ and between‐couple differences with results that are readily accessible for researchers and clinicians. This article offers a primer in using spatial statistics as a methodological tool for analyzing dyadic data. The article will introduce spatial approaches, review data structure required for spatial analysis, available software, and examples of data output.     

Nonparametric hypothesis testing for equality of means on the simplex

We investigate use of empirical and exponential empirical likelihood, and Hotelling and James statistics, to test the null hypothesis of equal population means based on two independent samples of data on the simplex. We perform an extensive numerical study using data simulated from various distributions on the simplex. The results, taken together with practical considerations regarding implementation, support the use of bootstrap-calibrated James statistic.     

Pilot test of a home-based program to prevent perceived insufficient milk

Problem

Although the World Health Organization and American Academy of Pediatrics recommend exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months, only 22% of U.S. mothers do so. Mothers’ perceived insufficient milk (PIM) is the primary reason for breastfeeding discontinuation globally. There are two changeable causes of PIM: (1) mothers’ misinterpretation of their infant’s behavior, and (2) mothers’ lack of confidence in their ability to breastfeed.

On ‘telling better stories’*

Over the course of his forty-year career, Lawrence Grossberg has modelled a form of rigorous, politically-engaged, radically contextual social research. Writing about Cultural Studies in the abstract, he has often characterized this work as, principally, about ‘telling better stories,’ and he attempts to tell them in his work on the contemporary conjuncture through analyses of political struggles in the United States. However, in a moment where calls for and claims of ‘better’ cultural stories abound on both the Left and the Right, what exactly does it mean for Cultural Studies to tell them better? I suggest we can locate attempts to grapple with Cultural Studies’ ‘better stories’ problem in the space between Grossberg’s conjunctural work and his work on the identity and future of Cultural Studies. Highlighting these efforts, I clarify what it means for Cultural Studies to assume the responsibility of telling better stories given the specific contours of the present context.     

Critical standpoint: Leaders of color advancing racial equality in predominantly white organizations

Organizations are often core sites for the production and perpetuation of social inequality. Although the United States is becoming more racially diverse, organizational elites remain disproportionately white, and this mismatch contributes to increasing racial inequality. This article examines whether and how leaders of color within predominantly white organizations can help their organizations address racial inequality. Our analysis uses data from a national study of politically oriented civic organizations and ethnographic fieldwork within one predominantly white organization. We draw on institutional work research, the outsider‐within concept, and insights from critical whiteness theory to explain how leaders of color can use their position and “critical standpoint” to help guide their organization toward advancing racial equality. The qualitative analysis shows how such leaders, when empowered, help their organization address race internally by (a) providing alternatives to white‐dominated perspectives, (b) developing tools to educate white members about racial inequality, and (c) identifying and addressing barriers to becoming a more racially diverse organization. The qualitative analysis also shows how leaders of color help their organization address race externally by (a) sharing personal narratives about living in a white‐dominated society and (b) brokering collaborations with organizations led by people of color. This research has implications for organizations seeking to promote social equality: Organizational leaders from marginalized status groups can help their organizations address social inequality, if those leaders possess a critical standpoint and sufficient organizational authority.     

Economic and Institutional Context and Second Births in Seven European Countries

The extent to which mothers progress to a second child varies greatly between European countries. Although both institutional and economic context are believed to be partly responsible for these differences, available research on economic conditions and fertility mostly focuses on first births and studies on family policy and fertility have hitherto insufficiently addressed population heterogeneity. Combining longitudinal microdata from the Harmonized Histories with contextual data on labour market uncertainty and family policy, this paper uses discrete-time hazard models to analyse the impact of economic and institutional context on second birth hazards of 22,298 women in 7 European countries between 1970 and 2002. Particular attention is paid to variation in the contextual effects by level of education. We find that aggregate-level unemployment and temporary employment reduce second birth hazards, particularly for low- and medium-level educated women. Family policies are positively related to second birth hazards. Whereas family allowances stimulate second births particularly among low educated mothers, the positive effect of childcare is invariant by level of education.     

Human resource management and performance

The study of human resource management (HRM) has been invigorated by the promise that there is a best-practice, high-involvement management (HIM) that can guarantee superior organizational performance. None the less, there remain concerns that contingency theory still rules, that is, that the fit between the human resource systems and their context, and particularly the organization's business strategy, is all important and, thus, that HIM will only outperform other systems in certain circumstances. In the 1990s, there has been a spate of research that has sought to test whether HIM is indeed universally relevant. This paper reviews these studies. The paper first introduces the conceptual dimensions of the debate concerning HRM and performance. This shows that the issues go beyond a simple competition between universalism and contingency theory. There are more complicated hypotheses linking human resource practices beneath the surface of the recent literature. The second part of the paper overviews the studies in the light of these hypotheses, revealing that they present an uneven picture. Firstly, there are conceptual differences underlying the studies and, secondly, the results vary between them, and the effects of HIM vary between performance measures even in particular studies. Though a fair number of the studies claim to support universalism, their claims are not always unequivocally supported by their research evidence, and it is premature to conclude in its favour. If anything, there is more support for the 'lean production' argument that stresses the interaction effect between HIM and total quality management on performance.     

Spherical regression models with general covariates and anisotropic errors

Statistics and Computing - Existing parametric regression models in the literature for response data on the unit sphere assume that the covariates have particularly simple structure, for example...