Applied Social and Community Interventions for Crisis in Times of National and International Conflict

This article discusses the social, community, national, and international psychological implications of the great energy and movement in our country after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. To determine ways that applied psychologists can have a positive effect on the crisis, Kurt Lewin's (1948; 1951) concept of locomotion at community and national levels is used to discuss the need for interventions that will produce driving factors to continue movement toward positive helping behaviors, and restraining factors when this momentum leads to potentially dangerous responses to the conflict (e.g., group think, an overextended enthusiasm for war, a sense of psychological immediacy or nonimmediacy for victims, and prejudice against Muslim individuals). The author offers ten approaches that applied psychologists could use to drive, restrain, and guide locomotion in this and similar crises both in the United States and abroad.     

The Effect of Revenue Diversification on Output Creation in Nonprofit Organizations: A Resource Dependence Perspective

Nonprofits continue to be faced with financial challenges to fulfill their missions. Both the academic literature and nonprofit practitioners have explored revenue diversification and concentration strategies to meet these challenges. While these two strategies are essentially antagonistic, both have received support as being viable strategies to create better outcomes for the organization. This article examines whether revenue diversification or concentration strategies lead to greater mission outputs in a nonprofit context. Using resource dependence theory as a guiding framework, two opposing hypotheses are tested to gain more insight into the diversification versus concentration dilemma. A unique dataset is built and utilized to estimate a zero-inflated negative binomial regression model to assess the correlation between revenue diversification and mission outputs. Results indicate that revenue diversification (and not concentration) is associated with an increase in organizational outputs.     

The Changing Safety Net for Low-Income Parents and Their Children: Structural or Cyclical Changes in Income Support Policy?

Refundable tax credits and food assistance are the largest transfer programs available to able-bodied working poor and near-poor families in the United States, and simultaneous participation in these programs has more than doubled since the early 2000s. To understand this growth, we construct a series of two-year panels from the 1981–2013 waves of the Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic Supplement to estimate the effect of state labor-market conditions, federal and state transfer program policy choices, and household demographics governing joint participation in food and refundable tax credit programs. Overall, changing policy drives much of the increase in the simultaneous, biennial use of food assistance and refundable tax credits. This stands in stark contrast from the factors accounting for the growth in food assistance alone, where cyclical and structural labor market factors account for at least one-half of the growth, and demographics play a more prominent role. Moreover, since 2000, the business cycle factors as the leading determinant in biennial participation decisions in food programs and refundable tax credits, suggesting a recent strengthening in the relationship between economic conditions and transfer programs.     

The Effects of Revealed Information on Catastrophe Loss Projection Models’ Characterization of Risk: Damage Vulnerability Evidence from Florida

We examine whether the risk characterization estimated by catastrophic loss projection models is sensitive to the revelation of new information regarding risk type. We use commercial loss projection models from two widely employed modeling firms to estimate the expected hurricane losses of Florida Atlantic University's building stock, both including and excluding secondary information regarding hurricane mitigation features that influence damage vulnerability. We then compare the results of the models without and with this revealed information and find that the revelation of additional, secondary information influences modeled losses for the windstorm‐exposed university building stock, primarily evidenced by meaningful percent differences in the loss exceedance output indicated after secondary modifiers are incorporated in the analysis. Secondary risk characteristics for the data set studied appear to have substantially greater impact on probable maximum loss estimates than on average annual loss estimates. While it may be intuitively expected for catastrophe models to indicate that secondary risk characteristics hold value for reducing modeled losses, the finding that the primary value of secondary risk characteristics is in reduction of losses in the “tail” (low probability, high severity) events is less intuitive, and therefore especially interesting. Further, we address the benefit‐cost tradeoffs that commercial entities must consider when deciding whether to undergo the data collection necessary to include secondary information in modeling. Although we assert the long‐term benefit‐cost tradeoff is positive for virtually every entity, we acknowledge short‐term disincentives to such an effort.     

The role of the media in developing a shared moral understanding

Over the last few decades, research has shown that media outlets are good at telling people what to think about, fulfilling what researchers call the agenda-setting role of the media. To that end, media outlets from social media to newspapers can play a pivotal role in developing a shared moral understanding.     

Simple Robust Tests for Autocorrelated Errors in Time Series Design Intervention Models

A simple, robust test for the autocorrelation parameter in an intervention time-series model (AB design) is proposed. It is analogous to the traditional tests and can easily be computed by using the freeware R. In the same way as traditional tests of autocorrelation are based on least squares (LS) fits of a linear model, our robust test is based on the highly efficient Wilcoxon fit of the linear model. We present the results of a Monte Carlo study which show that our robust test inherits the good efficiency properties of this Wilcoxon fit. Its empirical power is only slightly less than the empirical power of the least squares test over situations with normally distributed errors while it exhibited much more power over situations with error distributions having tails heavier than those of a normal distribution. It also showed robustness of validity over all null situations simulated. We also present the results of the application of our test to a real data set which illustrates the robustness of our test.     

Prespective from a weather modification experiment

This article provides some views on the statistical design and analysis of weather modification experiments. Perspectives were developed from experience with analyses of the Santa Barbara Phase I experiment summarized in Section 2, Randomization analvses are reported and compared with previously published parametric analyses. The parametric significance levels of tests for a cloud seeding effect agree well with the significance levels of the new corresponding randomization tests, These results, along with similar results of others, suggest that parametric analyses may be used as approximations to randomization analyses in exploratory analyses or reanalyses of weather modification experimental data.     

On equivalence of fractional factorial designs based on singular value decomposition

The singular value decomposition of a real matrix always exists and is essentially unique. Based on the singular value decomposition of the design matrices of two general 2-level fractional factorial designs, new necessary and sufficient conditions for the determination of combinatorial equivalence or non-equivalence of the corresponding designs are derived. Equivalent fractional factorial designs have identical statistical properties for estimation of factorial contrasts and for model fitting. Non-equivalent designs, however, may have the same statistical properties under one particular model but different properties under a different model. Results extend to designs with factors at larger number of levels.     

Developing evidence-based interventions for deployment into school settings: A case example highlighting key issues of efficacy and effectiveness

This paper describes the development of an after-school program for middle-school students that simultaneously addressed issues of efficacy and effectiveness in an effort to create an evidence-based intervention (EBI) that can be implemented in school settings. The topics highlighted in this case example are intended to address the growing concern that over-focusing on efficacy in well-controlled, grant-funded studies has resulted in a generation of EBI that are not acceptable, feasible, or sustainable in the majority of applied settings. Our case example focuses on six key issues highlighted in the published research literature: sustainability, recruitment, methodological design, flexibility, training, and meaningful outcomes. We briefly summarize each of these issues and relate them to our experiences conducting a successful pilot study. A summary of the pilot study results is also presented to lend support for the utilization of the EBI model of dissemination described in this paper.     

Assessment of workplace product accessibility: a human factors perspective

This paper illustrates the advantages of using human factors evaluation techniques as a method of informing rehabilitation service provider decisions about client care and assistive technology selection. Successful integration of accessibility evaluation techniques can strengthen an evidence based service program and offer service providers another tool for providing efficient, effective, and rapid services to individuals in need. With accessibility evaluation data showing the functional abilities required to operate a given product or set of products, it is possible to empirically demonstrate that an individual has the potential to successfully utilize the provided workplace equipment. Conversely, if the accessibility evaluation data reveal that the functional capabilities required to use a product exceed the capabilities of a given user, it would be possible to demonstrate the need for particular interventions or accommodations. With accessibility evaluation data, service providers can make better informed decisions about client care.