Quality of Life Predictors and Normative Data

This study identifies predictors and normative data for quality of life (QOL) in a sample of Portuguese adults from general population. A cross-sectional correlational study was undertaken with two hundred and fifty-five (N = 255) individuals from Portuguese general population (mean age 43 years, range 25–84 years; 148 females, 107 males). Participants completed the European Portuguese version of the World Health Organization Quality of Life short-form instrument and the European Portuguese version of the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale. Demographic information was also collected. Portuguese adults reported their QOL as good. The physical, psychological and environmental domains predicted 44 % of the variance of QOL. The strongest predictor was the physical domain and the weakest was social relationships. Age, educational level, socioeconomic status and emotional status were significantly correlated with QOL and explained 25 % of the variance of QOL. The strongest predictor of QOL was emotional status followed by education and age. QOL was significantly different according to: marital status; living place (mainland or islands); type of cohabitants; occupation; health. The sample of adults from general Portuguese population reported high levels of QOL. The life domain that better explained QOL was the physical domain. Among other variables, emotional status best predicted QOL. Further variables influenced overall QOL. These findings inform our understanding on adults from Portuguese general population QOL and can be helpful for researchers and practitioners using this assessment tool to compare their results with normative data.     

The Role of Friendship,Trust, and Love in Happy German Marriages

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore the role that friendship, trust, and love played in the courtship and marriages of eleven German heterosexual couples (twenty-two individuals, including three couples of mixed national heritage) who reported their marriages to be happy. A conceptual model is proposed of how the components of friendship, trust, and love (i.e., love experienced as emotion, behavior, and commitment) may form a foundation for happy German marriages. Identified themes inform suggestions for how these findings can be used by educators, practitioners, and clergy to support and strengthen German marriages.     

Discursive strategies in the construction of national identity: A critical discourse analysis of the Gibraltar issue in the printed media

Gibraltar is a community in which political conflicts are common, but has quite frequently been ignored in the academic world, despite its great interest and uniqueness. The present research offers a new perspective into the study of the Gibraltarian identity as it adheres to the theoretical paradigm known as Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA), which analyses language in relation to the social context in which it appears, aiming at providing social criticism based on linguistic evidence. This article focuses on the representation of the Gibraltar issue in a crucial moment for this community – namely the 2002 referendum. The textual corpus consists of editorial articles drawn from Gibraltarian newspapers examining how the Gibraltarian community was perceived and represented. Hence, the present CDA of editorial articles in relation to the referendum held in Gibraltar sheds light on a controversial situation: the Gibraltarian community and its distinctive identity.     

A unified epistemological theory of information processing

Theory and Decision - What does it mean for an agent faced with choice under uncertainty to “know” something? While a variety of mathematical methods are available to construct formal...     

Standard statistical tools for the breed allocation problem

Modern technologies are frequently used in order to deal with new genomic problems. For instance, the STRUCTURE software is usually employed for breed assignment based on genetic information. However, standard statistical techniques offer a number of valuable tools which can be successfully used for dealing with most problems. In this paper, we investigated the capability of microsatellite markers for individual identification and their potential use for breed assignment of individuals in seventy Lidia breed lines and breeders. Traditional binomial logistic regression is applied to each line and used to assign one individual to a particular line. In addition, the area under receiver operating curve (AUC) criterion is used to measure the capability of the microsatellite-based models to separate the groups. This method allows us to identify which microsatellite loci are related to each line. Overall, only one subject was misclassified or a 99.94% correct allocation. The minimum observed AUC was 0.986 with an average of 0.997. These results suggest that our method is competitive for animal allocation and has some interpretative advantages and a strong relationship with methods based on SNPs and related techniques.     

Structured orthogonal families of one and two strata prime basis factorial models

The models in structured families correspond to the treatments of a fixed effects base design \(\pi \) . Then the action of factors in \(\pi \) , on the fixed effects parameters of the models, is studied. Analyzing such a families enables the study of the action of nesting factors on the effects and interactions of nested factors. When \(\pi \) has an orthogonal structure, the family of models is said to be orthogonal. The models in the family can have one, two or more strata. Models with more than one stratum are obtained through nesting of one stratum models. A general treatment of the case in which the base design has orthogonal structure is presented and a special emphasis is given to the families of prime basis factorials models. These last models are, as it is well known, widely used in fertilization trials.     

A new mathematical approach for the estimation of the AUC and its variability under different experimental designs in preclinical studies

The aim of the present work was to develop a new mathematical method for estimating the area under the curve (AUC) and its variability that could be applied in different preclinical experimental designs and amenable to be implemented in standard calculation worksheets. In order to assess the usefulness of the new approach, different experimental scenarios were studied and the results were compared with those obtained with commonly used software: WinNonlin® and Phoenix WinNonlin®. The results do not show statistical differences among the AUC values obtained by both procedures, but the new method appears to be a better estimator of the AUC standard error, measured as the coverage of 95% confidence interval. In this way, the new proposed method demonstrates to be as useful as WinNonlin® software when it was applicable. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Exploring the Complex Associations Among Social Determinants of Health in Andalusia After the 2008 Financial Crisis

Social Indicators Research - In this study, we disentangle the complex relationship between structural and intermediary social determinants of health in Andalusia (Spain) after the period of...     

Does deregulation decrease unemployment? An empirical analysis of the Spanish labour market

Spain underwent two major labour reforms in 2010 and 2012 under the assumption that deregulating the labour market and decentralizing collective bargaining would automatically reduce unemployment (deregulation hypothesis). This article highlights the impact of demand and the sectoral structure of the economy to explain the behaviour of this variable (structural hypothesis). Analysing subnational panel data, the authors assess the capacity of these two hypotheses to explain unemployment trends. Their results cast doubt on the deregulation hypothesis and indicate the importance of cyclical and structural factors.