Life change,health status and life satisfaction: A reconsideration

Recent research has suggested that life changes may be unrelated to health status indices and to overall satisfaction with life. Yet research has also reported that life changes appear to be related to measures of psychological distress. To attend further to clarification of the role of life change as a predictor of health status and life satisfaction, this paper examines the relationship between negative life change self-reports and indices of health status and life satisfaction. The data come from a survey of 1423 Northwestern Wisconsinites interviewed in 1974 by the Wisconsin Survey Research Laboratory. The findings indicate that self-reports of negative life changes were related to overall life satisfaction, controlling for health status, feelings of alienation/attachment, and personal disruption. Implications of the findings are discussed in conclusion.     

Robust hierarchical Bayes estimation of exchangeable means

Estimation of the mean of a multivariate normal distribution is considered. The components of the mean vector θ are assumed to be exchangeable; this is modelled in a hierarchical fashion with independent Cauchy distributions as the first-stage prior. The resulting generalized Bayes estimator is calculated and shown to be robust with respect to the presence of outlying means. Alternative estimators that have similar behaviour but are cheaper to compute are also derived.     

CHARLES HENRY WICKENS: 1872–1939

An account of the life of the second Commonwealth Statistician, Charles Henry Wickens (1872–1939), has been given. After a primary school education in a Victorian country centre, Wickens became Associate of the Institute of Actuaries. Having joined the public service of Western Australia in 1897, he was appointed Compiler in the Commonwealth Bureau of Census and Statistics in 1906; he served as Commonwealth Statistician and Actuary, 1922 to 1932, giving outstanding service as government adviser and head of an important government department. He was a leader among theoretical and practical economists. His contributions to the study of Australian demography, especially life tables and vital statistics, were of the highest quality and permanent value. He made also scholarly contributions to actuarial theory and to the popularization of the work of the Bureau.     

Statistical issues in epidemiologic studies of the health effects of ambient acid aerosols

Although the ecologic effects of acid rain have been widely reported, relatively little is known about the effects of acidic air pollution on human health. Some epidemiologic and animal studies suggest, however, that acidity is an important determinant of the respiratory health effects of aerosols. This paper reviews some of that evidence and discusses its implications for the design and analysis of epidemiologic studies. We contrast two types of exposure patterns: peak exposures associated with air pollution episodes, and chronic exposures resulting from persistently high levels of air pollutants. Recent work on the analysis of repeated categorical outcome variables provides new methods for the analysis of episode studies. Studies of long-term exposure require comparisons among population groups, and these comparisons can be subject to the design effects characteristic of multistage sample surveys. We examine the implications of these design effects for epidemiologic studies. Finally, the paper discusses the measurement errors induced by the use of outdoor measurements to quantify personal exposure to air pollutants. Recent work on methods for errors-in-variables problems may aid in assessing the effects of such errors on conventional analyses of air-pollution studies.     

EVALUATING FAMILY THERAPY: DIVERGENT METHODS, DIVERGENT FINDINGS

This study reports on a triangulation strategy for assessing family interaction, involving family members, their therapist and coders independently viewing videotapes. Utilizing a standardized scale, the Beavers-Timberlawn Model of Family Competence, the study found weak agreement between paired assessments within the family triad, and within the therapist-coder dyad. In addition, more complex scaling techniques such as composite "family scores" or discrepancy scores between family member dyads added no predictive power. The findings suggest that a "limit of concordance" may exist when comparing varying raters' assessments of a given family, and that methodological and/or scaling strategies designed to maximize agreement may be both fruitless and diversionary.     

Community Participation and Rural Water Supply Development in Sierra Leone

Provision of improved water wells is part of the integratedapproach to rural development, currently undertaken by developmentagencies in Sierra Leone. Community self-help in meeting partof the cost of input to be provided is essential in promotingthe effective utilization of the service provided. This studysurveys the improved water wells programme of Plan InternationalRural Development Project in Makari-Gbanti Chiefdom, NorthernProvince of Sierra Leone. The improved wells were found to be least effective in meetingdry season water supplies to villagers. Among the factors responsiblefor this situation is the illconceived nature of the communityself-help development strategy adopted. Villagers were foundto meet part of the cost of the improved well not because ofthe genuine felt need for the system, but because they are interestedin the associated benefits of the integrated package –roads, schools, health centres, community centres etc. The final section introduces a case study village of a successfulwater supply scheme through a well-conceived community involvementstrategy. Lively community self-help is the key to promotingeffectively manned schemes in Sierra Leone.