Pornography,erotica, and attitudes toward women: The effects of repeated exposure

It is a widespread belief that pornography causes negative attitudes toward women, but tests of this belief are contradictory. A large body of research has studied the effect of violent pornography on behavior, but the effects of erotica and violence have often been confounded. Thus, the relationship between pornography and attitudes toward women was assessed in two correlational studies, and the effect of (nonviolent) erotica on attitudes towards women was tested experimentally. The dependent measure was the score on a questionnaire measuring attitudes toward women and women's issues. The questionnaire possessed high reliability; factor analysis indicated a single general factor. Participants included 184 psychology students and 20 patrons at an “adult” theater. Multiple linear regressions indicated that hours of viewing pornography was not a reliable predictor of attitudes toward women in either sample. Patrons of the adult theater, who viewed more pornography, had more favorable attitudes toward women than male or female college students. In Study 3, 75 students were randomly assigned to watch four hours of erotica or four hours of psychology films over five consecutive days. Power analysis indicated a strong test. Manipulation checks showed a difference in students’ perception of the erotic nature of the videos, but attitudes toward women were not influenced by type of video.     

Smooth nonparametric quantile estimation under censoring: simulations and bootstrap methods

Based on right-censored data from a lifetime distribution F , a smooth nonparametric estimator of the quantile function Q (p) is given by Qn(p)=h 1jjQn(t)K((t-p)/h)dt, where QR(p) denotes the product-limit quantile function. Extensive Monte Carlo simulations indicate that at fixed p this kernel-type quantile estimator has smaller mean squared error than (L(p) for a range of values of the bandwidth h. A method of selecting an "optimal" bandwidth (in the sense of small estimated mean squared error) based on the bootstrap is investigated yielding results consistent with the simulation study. The bootstrap is also used to obtain interval estimates for Q (p) after determining the optimal value of h.     

Bayes estimation of reliability for the two-parameter lognormal distribution

Bayes estimators of reliability for the lognormal failure distribution with two parameters (M,∑) are obtained both for informative priors of normal-gamma type and for the vague prior of Jeffreys. The estimators are in terms of the t-distribution function. The Bayes estimators are compared with the maximum likelihood and minimum variance unbiased estimators of reliabil-ity using Monte Carlo simulations.     

Estimation for the three-parameter inverse gaussian distribution

The three-parameter inverse Gaussian distribution is defined and moment estimators and maximum likelihood estimators are obtained. The moment estimators are found in closed form and their asymprotic normality is proven. A sufficient condition is provided for the existence of the maximum likelihood estimators.