An evaluation of the childhood family structure measures from the sixth wave of the British Household Panel Survey

Summary.  The paper performs an evaluation of the data that were collected in the sixth wave of the British Household Panel Survey (BHPS) on childhood family structure. After comparing such data with a large number of studies by using external sources, we find that the BHPS data overestimate the proportion of people who report an experience of life in a non-intact family during childhood by about 10%. Although an explanation based on recall error that deteriorates with the age of the BHPS respondents is possible, the overestimation is likely to be accounted for by non-ignorable attrition that may affect most of the comparison studies based on longitudinal data. Conversely, comparisons with other independent measurements from the BHPS itself reveal that the wave 6 data underestimate the proportion of young people who have lived at least part of their childhood in a non-intact family by about 8%. The probability of disagreement between these two sets of measures is strongly associated with poor interview characteristics, which may affect the comparison measure more than the wave 6 measure. Despite such differences, there is therefore a substantial degree of similarity between the family structure information that was collected in the sixth wave of the BHPS and the host of highly diverse records against which it has been compared.     

Beheimatungsprozesse begleiten — ein Werkstattbericht

Supporting processes of belonging in supervision and coachingThe contemporary employee has to cope with frequent changes. Not only does he lose his familiar environment, he also has to find ways to familiarize himself with new places and to develop a fresh sense of belonging. This process can be understood and facilitated by interpreting the German concept of “Heimat“ as something we have to create ourselves. First experiences demonstrate the usefulness of this approach in coaching processes.     

Expected sample moments of concomitants of selected order statistics

In this paper, the task of determining expected values of sample moments, where the sample members have been selected based on noisy information, is considered. This task is a recurring problem in the theory of evolution strategies. Exact expressions for expected values of sums of products of concomitants of selected order statistics are derived. Then, using Edgeworth and Cornish-Fisher approximations, explicit results that depend on coefficients that can be determined numerically are obtained. While the results are exact only for normal populations, it is shown experimentally that including skewness and kurtosis in the calculations can yield greatly improved results for other distributions.     

An experimental investigation of the impact of ambiguity on the valuationof self-insurance and self-protection

We build two experimental markets to examine individual valuations of risk reductions with two risk-management tools: self-insurance and self-protection. We find no positive evidence that the risk-reducing mechanisms constitute a “frame.” Ambiguity in the probability on average affects valuation only weakly, and changes in the representation of ambiguity do not alter valuation. Finally, unlike the results obtained by Hogarth and Kunreuther for the case of market insurance, our findings do not provide a strong support for the “Anchoring and Adjustment” ambiguity model.     

不同权力结构下碳税对供应链减排水平的影响

随着我国生态文明建设的不断推进,促进供应链协同减排成为生产和消费领域落实绿色发展理念的重要举措。在绿色供应链的管理实践中,不同类型的供应链核心企业在进行减排决策时会有不同的侧重点,因此供应链权力的结构成为影响供应链减排水平的关键因素。本文在一个由两个制造商和一个零售商组成的两级供应链中研究了不同权力结构下的供应链最优减排和定价决策问题,分别给出了零售商主导和制造商主导的Stackelberg-Nash博弈均衡解,并分析了产品的单位生产成本、单位批发价格、碳税税率等参数对供应链最优决策的影响。本文的研究结果表明：（1）在两种供应链权力结构下,当产品的单位批发价格固定时,降低产品的生产成本都可以促使制造商提高减排水平;但是当产品的单位生产成本固定时,提高产品的批发价格却不一定总是能够激励制造商提高减排水平;（2）在两种供应链权力结构下,对于低排放行业的制造商来说,提高碳税税率可以增加产品的减排水平,但是对于高排放行业的制造商来说,提高碳税税率反而会降低产品的减排水平;（3）一般来说,零售商占主导地位的供应链中产品减排水平和供应链总利润相对较高,供应链碳排放总量相对较低。最后,与供应链集中决策模式相比,随着产品批发价格的增加,两种分散决策模式下的供应链双重边际效应逐渐增强。数值实验结果显示：在碳税税率的一定取值范围内,这种双重边际效应会使得两种分散决策模式下的产品最优减排水平和供应链碳排放总量均优于集中决策模式。本文的研究可为碳税政策下供应链的协同减排提供有益的管理启示。     

跨界搜寻对新创科技企业绩效的影响

跨界搜寻是新创科技企业突破资源短缺和技术匮乏双重束缚的重要途径,然而其内在作用机理尚待挖掘剖析。基于资源拼凑理论视角,构建了跨界搜寻影响新创科技企业绩效的中介模型,进而采用多元回归分析和Bootstrap等方法,对201份企业样本数据进行了实证分析。研究结果表明:（1）前瞻型搜寻与反应型搜寻对新创科技企业绩效均具有显著正向影响;（2）前瞻型搜寻与反应型搜寻之间存在互补效应,该互补效应显著正向影响新创科技企业绩效;（3）在作用机制方面,资源拼凑在前瞻型搜寻与新创科技企业绩效之间起到部分中介作用,而在反应型搜寻与新创科技企业绩效之间发挥完全中介作用。     

Going to Pieces: Paul Monette and the Fragments of the Tribe

Author of the highly acclaimed Borrowed Time: An AIDS Memoir (1988) and winner of the 1992 National Book Award for his autobiography Becoming a Man: Half a Life Story, Paul Monette died of complications from AIDS in Los Angeles on February 12, 1995. His most recent work, Last Watch of the Night: Essays Too Personal and Otherwise (1994), is his third volume in a trilogy of autobiographical writing on growing up gay, coming-out, and living with AIDS. A graduate of Phillips Academy and Yale University, Monette received a number of awards for his writing and his work as an outspoken voice in the battle against AIDS, including the National Book Award, three Lambda Literary awards, the PEN Center West Freedom to Write Award, and three honorary doctorate degrees, from Wesleyan University, the City University of New York, and the State University of New York at Oswego. A memorial service was held for Monette on Sunday, February 19, 1995, at the Directors Guild of America on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles. Paul Monette was 49.     

Sensitivity of the Optimum to Perturbations of the Profit or Weight of an Item in the Binary Knapsack Problem

In the binary single constraint Knapsack Problem, denoted KP, we are given a knapsack of fixed capacity c and a set of n items. Each item j, j = 1,...,n, has an associated size or weight w_j and a profit p_j. The goal is to determine whether or not item j, j = 1,...,n, should be included in the knapsack. The objective is to maximize the total profit without exceeding the capacity c of the knapsack. In this paper, we study the sensitivity of the optimum of the KP to perturbations of either the profit or the weight of an item. We give approximate and exact interval limits for both cases (profit and weight) and propose several polynomial time algorithms able to reach these interval limits. The performance of the proposed algorithms are evaluated on a large number of problem instances.