What’s in a Topic? Exploring the Interaction Between Test-taker Age and Item Content in High-Stakes Testing

The research reported in this article investigates differential item functioning (DIF) in a listening comprehension test. The study explores the relationship between test-taker age and the items’ language domains across multiple test forms. The data comprise test-taker responses (N = 2861) to a total of 133 unique items, 46 items of which were shared across two or more forms. Twenty-one items demonstrated DIF. However, there was no pattern by language domain. Eleven items showing DIF appeared in more than one test form but DIF for these items occurred only once.     

Citalopram-Associated Gambling: A Case Report

Pathological gambling behaviour is a side effect of dopaminergic drugs used in Parkinson’s disease, but has seldom been reported with selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. A 58-years-old woman with somatisation disorder since the age of 20 and recent-onset major depression (at 54 years) received 40 mg/day intravenous citalopram, thereafter switching to the same dose of oral citalopram to treat her comorbid psychiatric disorders after showing poor response to paroxetine for one year. Her anxious and depressive symptoms were moderately reduced after 7 months of oral citalopram, but simultaneously, the patient admitted gambling. We gradually discontinued citalopram and introduced pregabalin and alprazolam; this was followed by a reduction of gambling compulsions, but the somatisation and depressive symptoms did not further improve. Pathological gambling may be mediated by an interplay of 5-HT_1A serotonergic and D₂ dopaminergic mechanisms. Citalopram affects both these mechanisms in areas that were shown to be involved in gambling behaviour, but while dopaminergic effects of citalopram appear to be consistent with the induction of gambling, its serotonergic mechanisms are rather inconsistent. In our patient, mood destabilisation induced by citalopram may have contributed to the first onset of pathological gambling.     

Social Entrepreneurship and Institutional Sustainability: Insights from an Embedded Social Enterprise

VOLUNTAS: International Journal of Voluntary and Nonprofit Organizations - Mainstream enterprises function by alleviating the cognitive burdens on their members and hence generating an...     

PERCEIVED GAME UNCERTAINTY,SUSPENSE AND THE DEMAND FOR SPORT

This study tries bridging between different behavioral economic explanations for the lack of support of the uncertainty of outcome hypothesis in spectator sports. We test a measure of perceived game uncertainty that is comparable to objective measures frequently tested in the literature. Econometric results suggest that fans do not perceive closeness of a game differently than how economists have tended to measure it. However, fans' perceptions of suspensefulness are distinct from their perceptions of game uncertainty. Moreover, the finding that fans' preferences for game uncertainty are dominated by loss aversion also emerges—independently of fanship status—in our stated‐preference setting. (JEL L83, D12, Z2)     

Greasy Roads: The Impact of Bad Financial News on Road Traffic Accidents

We use evidence from a natural experiment in Greece to study the effect of the announcement of austerity measures on road traffic accidents (RTAs). We use daily RTA data from 2010 and 2011, during which a number of austerity measures were announced, including salary and pension cuts and an increase in direct and indirect taxes. We find that controlling for other factors potentially influencing RTAs, the number of RTAs increased significantly on the first two days following the announcements of austerity measures. We put forward some tentative suggestions for why this happens.     

Adolescent Online Gambling: The Impact of Parental Practices and Correlates with Online Activities

We present results from a cross-sectional study of the entire adolescent student population aged 12–19 of the island of Kos and their parents, on the relationship between their Internet gambling and respective parental practices, including aspects of psychological bonding and online security measures. The sample consisted of 2,017 students (51.8% boys, 48.2% girls). Our results indicate that gender, parenting practices as perceived by the adolescents and distinct patterns of adolescent Internet activities are among the best predictor variables for Internet gambling. Security practices exercised by the parents failed to make an impact on the extent of Internet gambling, demonstrating the need for specific measures to tackle this phenomenon since the provision of simple education on the dangers of the Internet is not sufficient to this regard.     

Multivariate generalized linear mixed models with?semi-nonparametric and smooth nonparametric random effects densities

We extend the family of multivariate generalized linear mixed models to include random effects that are generated by smooth densities. We consider two such families of densities, the so-called semi-nonparametric (SNP) and smooth nonparametric (SMNP) densities. Maximum likelihood estimation, under either the SNP or the SMNP densities, is carried out using a Monte Carlo EM algorithm. This algorithm uses rejection sampling and automatically increases the MC sample size as it approaches convergence. In a simulation study we investigate the performance of these two densities in capturing the true underlying shape of the random effects distribution. We also examine the implications of misspecification of the random effects distribution on the estimation of the fixed effects and their standard errors. The impact of the assumed random effects density on the estimation of the random effects themselves is investigated in a simulation study and also in an application to a real data set.     

ON CHARACTERIZING SOME BIVARIATE DISCRETE DISTRIBUTIONS

The bivariate (correlated) Poisson, binomial, negative binomial and logarithmic distributions are characterized by the conditional distribution of one random vector on the other and a regression function of the second random vector on the first. Characterizations of the above distributions when their component random variables are independent are also included.     

Characterizations based on generalized cumulative residual entropy functions

The Shannon entropy and the cumulative residual entropy (CRE) of a random variable are useful tools in probability theory. Recently, a new concept called generalized cumulative residual entropy (GCRE) of order n was introduced and studied. It is related with the record values of a sequence of i.i.d. random variables and with the relevation transform. In this paper, we show that, under some assumptions, the GCRE function of a fixed order n uniquely determines the distribution function. Some characterizations of particular probability models are obtained from this general result.     

On the generalized cumulative residual entropy weighted distributions

Recently, Feizjavadian and Hashemi (2015 Feizjavadian, S.H., Hashemi, R. (2015). Mean residual weighted versus the length-biased Rayleigh distribution. J. Stat. Comput. Simul. 85:2823–2838.[Taylor &; Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) introduced and studied the mean residual weighted (MRW) distribution as an alternative to the length-biased distribution, by using the concepts of the mean residual lifetime and the cumulative residual entropy (CRE). In this article, a new sequence of weighted distributions is introduced based on the generalized CRE. This sequence includes the MRW distribution. Properties of this sequence are obtained generalizing and extending previous results on the MRW distribution. Moreover, expressions for some known distributions are given, and finite mixtures between the new sequence of weighted distributions and the length-biased distribution are studied. Numerical examples are given to illustrate the new results.