Standard Errors for Elasticities: A Comparison of Bootstrap and Asymptotic Standard Errors

This article compares two methods of deriving standard errors for elasticities in a linear expenditure demand system with first-order autoregressive errors. The first is the ordinary Taylor series method and the second is Efron's bootstrap. In an example problem, these two methods yielded similar values for the standard errors, with the exception of the income elasticity standard errors, for which the asymptotic standard errors were apparently too large by a factor of two.     

STRANGE YET STYLISH HEADGEAR VR consumption and the construction of gender

This article examines how gender is inscribed and reproduced in the consumption of Virtual Reality (VR) technologies. The focus is on how virtual reality systems become embedded in 'everyday life' through leisure and consumption, and how the spectacles and disciplines associated with consumption sites produce gendered virtual subjects. Studies of new communications technologies have tended to polarize between 'cyberpunk'/'cyberfeminist' visions of bodily transcendence in 'cyberspaces', and the critique of such visions from social theorists who focus on the reproduction of social and cultural inequalities through technical systems. These approaches tend to neglect the specific sites in which the social relations of VR are played out. A 'multi-sited' ethnographic study of immersive virtual reality systems is the basis for discussion of how virtual reality technologies produce gender in specific sites. Virtual systems are positioned and used differently in various locales such as arcades and art galleries, bars and theme parks and cafes. The article discusses the practices of consumption which (re)produce and maintain conventional bodily and subjective boundaries. What relationships are becoming institutionalized? Are new conventions of gender created in these consumption relationships? The construction of spectacle and space, and the specific bodily disciplines required for participation in virtual realities in locations of consumption is particularly important in the formation of gender dynamics. Multiple subject positions are offered through competing technical, economic and cultural practices in diverse sites. These positions can establish new conventions of virtual identities and experiences, but also remain shot through with familiar operational categories of gendered identities and bodily practices. This article argues that immersive virtual reality technologies cannot be understood without some consideration of the locales in which they are embedded, and the social identities they make possible or constrain. A local, reflexive and feminist orientation assists in understanding the gendered dynamics associated with 'becoming virtual'.     

A comparative study of three leadership approaches in India

We examined the validity of three leadership approaches in an organization in India. We used a multi-theory and multi-method design to competitively test transformational leadership theory, the nurturant–task leadership model, and a local organization-specific leadership model. Transformation leadership theory is one of the most widely studied and accepted theories in Western countries and is viewed as a universalistic leadership approach. The nurturant–task leadership model was developed in India and viewed as a culture-specific leadership approach. We also developed a local leadership model, called RDO, a pseudonym for the organization, and viewed it as an organization-specific leadership approach, using a qualitative analysis of interview data. The overall results of our qualitative–quantitative work provide strong support for the RDO leadership model, some support for a nurturant–task leadership model, and minimal support for transformational leadership theory. These results suggest that research designs that include a multi-theory, multi-methods approach in a single culture have the potential to increase our understanding of leadership processes.     

Simple inference in multinomial and ordered logit

This paper provides some simple methods of interpreting the coefficients in multinomial logit and ordered logit models. These methods are summarized in Propositions concerning the magnitudes, signs, and patterns of partial derivatives of the outcome probabilities with respect to the exogenousvariables. The paper also provides an empirical example illustrating the use of these Propositions.