Population Dynamics and Animal Welfare: Issues Raised by the Culling of Kangaroos in Puckapunyal

The culling of kangaroos at the Puckapunyal Army base (Australia) raises some intriguing ethical issues around animal welfare. After discussing the costs and benefits of the cull, this paper addresses the more general animal welfare issues related to population dynamics. Natural selection favours the maximization of the number of surviving offspring. This need not result in the maximization of the welfare of individuals in the species. The contrast between growth maximization and welfare maximization is first illustrated for a single population and then discussed in terms of competing populations. In the Lotka-Volterra model of competing species and its generalizations, the choice of different birthrates does not affect the population sizes at equilibrium. Welfare could be much higher at lower birthrates without even reducing numbers (at equilibrium).     

Group psychosocial program for enhancing psychological well-being of people with systemic lupus erythematosus

Emotional ups and downs are common among people with Systemic Lupus Erythematosus (SLE) as they live with fears about treatment, pain from the illness and unexpected "flare-ups." The side effects of medications have a severe impact on their self-esteem and lead to psychological distress. This paper reports a study on the impact of a psychosocial group program on the self-esteem and psychosocial functioning of people with SLE. A total of 56 people with SLE were recruited to participate in a 6-week, 2.5-hour weekly session psychosocial group. The group served to equip members with knowledge and skills to cope with SLE and stress arising from the illness, to enhance their self-confidence and develop a positive attitude toward the illness, and to enhance their social support network. The members were assessed before the commencement and during the last session of the groups with Rosenberg's Self-esteem Inventory and General Health Questionnaire (GHQ-30). Results showed that members obtained better scores in self-esteem (p < 0.001) and GHQ (p < 0.001) after the group. The study revealed significant positive changes in self-esteem and psychosocial functioning of people with SLE after the psychosocial group program. The implications for psychosocial programs for people with SLE are discussed.     

Stagnation as a Distinct Clinical Syndrome: Comparing 'Yu' (Stagnation) in Traditional Chinese Medicine with Depression

Background: Depression was translated into Chinese as yiyu,with reference to the yu syndrome in traditional Chinese medicine.Literally meaning ‘not flowing, entangled or clogged’,yu, or ‘stagnation’ in English, is, however, a constructdistinct from depression. Objective: The study aimed to explorethe construct of stagnation through scale development. Method:A concept-driven approach was adopted to generate candidateitems for the Stagnation Scale. Other measures were a validitychecking item, a Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and a twelve-itemGeneral Health Questionnaire (GHQ-12). Respondents were recruitedby convenience and snowball sampling, resulting in 602 questionnairesbeing completed by adults between the ages of eighteen and sixty-five.Results: Exploratory factor analysis provided a three-factor,sixteen-item solution. The three factors were named Overattachment,Body-Mind Obstruction and Affect-Posture Inhibition. Cronbach’salphas of the entire scale and subscales ranged from 0.82 to0.91. Correlations of the scale total with the validity checkingitem, BDI and GHQ-12 were 0.71, 0.53 and 0.48, respectively.Stagnation showed a pattern of associations with demographicvariables different from depression. Conclusion: The StagnationScale has good psychometric properties, and has meaningful factorstructures. The evidence supports the contention that stagnationis a clinical syndrome distinct from depression. The new concepthas important implications for social work practice.     

The promised planet: alliances and struggles of the gerontocracy in American television science fiction of the 1960s

Introduction.?Erectile dysfunction (ED) is a common medical disorder affecting the aging male. A man's perception of a disease affects his health seeking behaviour. This study aimed to explore perceptions of ED among men with ED and how these perceptions came about.

Methods.?This qualitative study utilized in-depth interviews involving 17 urban men aged between 40 and 75 years old.

Results.?Misconceptions existed regarding the definitions of ED. Most men perceived impotence to be more serious than ED. Although most were aware of the medical causes of ED, ‘overuse of penis’ and black magic were mentioned as culturally-related causes. ED was perceived as a serious problem associated with loss of manhood and it had a significant impact on relationships with their partners. However, some adopted an ‘accepting’ view and attributed it to aging and fate. Most men were only familiar with PDE-5 inhibitors and traditional therapies. PDE-5 inhibitors were perceived to be effective but they were concerned about side effects and costs.

Conclusions.?Identifying men's perceptions of ED and its treatment would help doctors in their consultation, and inform health policy makers in planning appropriate public education and services.     

Change and Inertia in the New York State Medicaid Personal Care Services Program: An Institutional Case Study

This study analyzes how competing logics (belief systems) of stakeholders have influenced patterns of change and inertia in the development of the New York Medicaid Personal Care Services (PCS) program. A case-study methodology was used to collect documents, statistics, and interview data from four key stakeholder groups: state and city officials, PCS agencies, a labor union, and consumer advocates covering the period 1999 to 2005. The New York PCS program is one of the oldest, largest, and most stable programs in the United States. Its early unionization of workers resulted in relatively generous wages and benefits and made New York number one nationally in PCS spending per capita. In spite of wide support from stakeholder groups, the overall number of participants has gradually declined since 1999. A consumer-directed model of personal care developed in 1995 challenged the status quo and has grown steadily. Resistance by public officials, agency providers, and union representatives to the consumer-directed model has resulted in a small program that is often targeted toward individuals labeled “difficult to serve.” Dominant stakeholders in New York have ensured a stable personal care program that has resisted change and led to program inertia.     

Economic distress and health: A fixed effects analysis of low‐income persons in Singapore

Using fixed effects regressions, this study examined the transactional effects of different types of economic status on the physical and mental health of low‐income persons in Singapore. Among the economic variables considered, unemployment and arrears had the most significant effects. This signals the physical and psychological distress of being out of work and possessing arrears while income is low. The insignificant effects of poor health on household earnings suggest possible earnings supplementation by other household members. The findings imply the fruitfulness of dually improving employment prospects and health, work activation that takes into consideration mental health effects, increasing affordability of health services in liberal welfare systems, improving mental bandwidth through reducing arrears accounts, and short lag time from application to receipt of assistance. These implications point to a larger question on health and welfare systems in an increasingly uncertain economic environment for households in poverty. Key Practitioner Message: ? Employment and health are inter‐related: employment assistance incorporating physical and mental health interventions and vice versa can be more effective than either alone; ? Compared with decreasing arrears amounts, reducing the number of arrears can more effectively relieve mental distress; ? Effects between economic distress and health materialise quickly; minimising the lag time between application and receipt of assistance will provide great relief.     

Overnight and Daytime Stock-Return Dynamites on the London Stock Exchange: The Impacts of “Big Bang” and the 1987 Stock-Market Crash

We explore the time series properties of stock returns on the London Stock Exchange around the 1986 market restructuring (Big Bang) and the 1987 stock-market crash using a modified generalized autoregressive conditional heteroscedasticity model. Using this general dynamic model, which allows (a) intradaily returns to have different impacts and persistence on stock-return volatility, (b) return effects on volatility to be asymmetric, and (c) intradaily returns to follow conditional distributions with different fourth moments, we uncover important changes in return dynamics and conditional fourth moments following Big Bang and the 1987 crash not reported before.     

Procedures for Selecting Good Exponential Populations

Suppose exponential populations π _i with parameters (μ_i , σ_i ) (i = 1,2,…,k) are given. This article discusses how to select “good” populations in the sense of [Lam (1986 Lam, K. 1986. A new procedure for selecting good populations. Biometrika, 73(1): 201–206. [Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). A new procedure for selecting good populations. Biometrika 73(1):201–206]. Depending on whether the σ _i 's are known or unknown, several one-stage and a two-stage procedure of selection are proposed. The two-stage procedure can be replaced by a one-stage procedure if the second-stage sample is proved intangible. An attracting feature of these procedures is that they need no new statistical tables to implement.     

Dynamic Identification of Dynamic Stochastic General Equilibrium Models

This paper studies dynamic identification of parameters of a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium model from the first and second moments of the data. Classical results for dynamic simultaneous equations do not apply because the state space solution of the model does not constitute a standard reduced form. Full rank of the Jacobian matrix of derivatives of the solution parameters with respect to the parameters of interest is necessary but not sufficient for identification. We use restrictions implied by observational equivalence to obtain two sets of rank and order conditions: one for stochastically singular models and another for nonsingular models. Measurement errors, mean, long‐run, and a priori restrictions can be accommodated. An example is considered to illustrate the results.