A comparative approach to assessing the quality of life of intercollegiate athletes

Although concerns have frequently been raised recently regarding the quality of life of intercollegiate athletes, information is seldom available on which college and university administrators can base policy decisions. Particularly lacking are studies that provide administrators with assessments of their own athletics programs relative to athletics programs at other institutions. We describe here a method we used in conducting a comparative evaluation of the status of student-athletes at a large public university, involving comparisons of student-athletes at this university to student-athletes at a subset of the institutions that participated in the 1987–88 National Study of Intercollegiate Athletes. By utilizing existing data sets to construct comparison samples, relative assessments of the status of student-athletes at a given institution can be performed without the excessive costs of gathering data on student-athletes at comparison institutions. Techniques employed in data collection and analysis are discussed as well as the format of the report in which the findings of the study were presented.     

The impact of ideology on regulation: The case of board and care homes

Debates about regulatory efforts to monitor the delivery of health and long-term care have become commonplace in health policy. Efforts to examine the key assumptions underlying the current regulatory strategies have been limited, however. Using the board and care industry as an example, this article examines how ideology influences the regulatory strategy developed. Three ideological perspectives-a free-market approach, a market correction strategy, and a critical policy framework-are reviewed in the context of efforts to regulate board and care homes in the United States. Differences in approaches to regulating board and care are presented for each of the major perspectives.     

Partner Choice and the Differential Retreat From Marriage

The contemporary retreat from marriage in the United States has had a differential impact across socioeconomic and racial groups. Here, 1990 marriage rates and propensities for Virginia, North Carolina, and Wisconsin are analyzed regarding (a) the likelihood that persons in different groups ever marry and (b) patterns of partner choice with respect to race and educational level. Marriage remains strong in most race‐education groups but is substantially lower among Blacks and among those with less than 12 years of education. Patterns of partner choice have shifted to show greater symmetry between the educational levels of brides and grooms. Changes have been modest with regard to the level and pattern of interracial (Black‐White) marriage. Marriage is increasingly a union of equals, but a union chosen more by Whites than by Blacks and more by the well educated than by the poorly educated.     

Exposure Reconstruction for the TCDD-Exposed NIOSH Cohort Using a Concentration- and Age-Dependent Model of Elimination

Recent studies demonstrating a concentration dependence of elimination of 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD) suggest that previous estimates of exposure for occupationally exposed cohorts may have underestimated actual exposure, resulting in a potential overestimate of the carcinogenic potency of TCDD in humans based on the mortality data for these cohorts. Using a database on U.S. chemical manufacturing workers potentially exposed to TCDD compiled by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), we evaluated the impact of using a concentration- and age-dependent elimination model (CADM) (Aylward et al., 2005) on estimates of serum lipid area under the curve (AUC) for the NIOSH cohort. These data were used previously by Steenland et al. (2001) in combination with a first-order elimination model with an 8.7-year half-life to estimate cumulative serum lipid concentration (equivalent to AUC) for these workers for use in cancer dose-response assessment. Serum lipid TCDD measurements taken in 1988 for a subset of the cohort were combined with the NIOSH job exposure matrix and work histories to estimate dose rates per unit of exposure score. We evaluated the effect of choices in regression model (regression on untransformed vs. ln-transformed data and inclusion of a nonzero regression intercept) as well as the impact of choices of elimination models and parameters on estimated AUCs for the cohort. Central estimates for dose rate parameters derived from the serum-sampled subcohort were applied with the elimination models to time-specific exposure scores for the entire cohort to generate AUC estimates for all cohort members. Use of the CADM resulted in improved model fits to the serum sampling data compared to the first-order models. Dose rates varied by a factor of 50 among different combinations of elimination model, parameter sets, and regression models. Use of a CADM results in increases of up to five-fold in AUC estimates for the more highly exposed members of the cohort compared to estimates obtained using the first-order model with 8.7-year half-life. This degree of variation in the AUC estimates for this cohort would affect substantially the cancer potency estimates derived from the mortality data from this cohort. Such variability and uncertainty in the reconstructed serum lipid AUC estimates for this cohort, depending on elimination model, parameter set, and regression model, have not been described previously and are critical components in evaluating the dose-response data from the occupationally exposed populations.     

The prevalence rates of pathological gambling: A look at methods

Planning the gambling environment requires protection of the public's health, safety and welfare. Whereas most public gaming provisions and statutes address the public's fears of organized crime as well as some welfare needs, rarely do they safeguard the public's health regarding the spread of the mental disease known as pathological gambling. Measurement of the prevalence and incidence of this disease would enable policy planners to evaluate both the state's responsibility for an epidemic and the adequacy of publicly funded treatment programs. The purpose of this paper is to examine the methods which underlie three different estimates of the prevalence rate of pathological gambling and to critique them in the light of sound epidemiological procedure. In 1975, the Institute for Social Research (ISR) of the University of Michigan conducted a national survey and a survey of the state of Nevada on behalf of the U.S. Commission on a National Policy Toward Gambling. Using discriminant function analysis coupled with subjective inspection of cases in the at-risk pool, the researchers estimated rates of probable and potential pathological gamblers. In 1984 and 1985, this author surveyed residents in the Delaware Valley and the state of Ohio using the cumulative clinical signs method which also posited rates of probable and potential pathological gamblers. In 1986, researchers at the Office of Mental Health for the State of New York employed a formal screening device to survey residents and proposed a rate of probable pathological gamblers and a rate of problem — although not pathological — gamblers. All three approaches produced different estimates. The utility of prevalence and incidence rate research in this field is threatened by a lack of consensus about the proper epidemiological procedure to be employed in arriving at these estimates. There is also confusion about the distinction between a probable and a potential pathological gambler. The planning purpose, method, validity and reliability of prevalence rate research about pathological gambling are addressed in this paper.     

How bad can a voting location be

Two questions concerning the location of a single facility by a voting process are investigated for transportation networks:

- What is the maximum number of customers located on the network preferring some rival point over a voting solution?

- How does the average distance of the customers to the facility increase when a voting location instead of a Weber location is chosen for the facility?

Complete answers are given for general networks and for certain planar networks, viz., the so-called generalized cacti.     

Book reviews

Nathan Glazer Ethnic Dilemmas Harvard, Harvard University Press. 1985

Giddens, Anthony The Constitution of Society, Berkeley, University of California, 1985, pp.XXXVII, 402. Notes, glossary, diagrams, bibliographic notes and index.

Jeremy Rifkin Declaration of a Heretic. Boston. London, Melbourne and Henley, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1985, pp.X,140.

Ted Benton The Rise and Fall of Structural Marxism: Althusser and his Influence, New York, St.Martin's Press, 1984, pp. VII,259.

Raymond L. Garthoff Détente and Confrontation Washington, The Brookings Institution, 1985, pp.XVI,1126.

Joseph J. Collins The Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan. A Study in the Use of Force in Soviet Foreign Policy, Massachusetts/Toronto, D.C. Heath and Company/Lexington, 1986, pp. XV, 195.

Jan Shipps Mormonism: The Story of a New Religious Tradition, Chicago, University of Illinois Press, 1985, pp.211.

Robert Jay Lifton Home from the War: Vietnam Veterans: Neither Victims nor Executioners, New York, Basic Books, 1985, pp.478     

The ecosystem blueprint: How firms shape the design of an ecosystem according to the surrounding conditions

Ecosystems are formed by organisations that jointly create a value proposition that a single firm could not create in isolation. To deliver this value proposition, the partners need a focal firm, the orchestrator, to be align them towards the joint value proposition. Thus, how orchestrators design the alignment structure of an ecosystem is at the very heart of the ecosystem concept – yet it has not been sufficiently addressed by extant research. This is all the more true for the question of how the design of an ecosystem is shaped depending on surrounding conditions. This paper applies a qualitative study with ten cases and, based on the attention-based view of the firm, contributes to research on ecosystems in several ways. First, it explains which ecosystem designs are beneficial under which conditions. Second, it elucidates the structure and activities within ecosystems and shows that start-ups can be just as good ecosystem orchestrators as incumbents. Third, it explains the circumstances under which single vs. multi orchestrator ecosystems occur. Fourth, it presents the conditions when incumbents or start-ups make better orchestrators. Finally, it is among the first studies to apply the attention-based view to business ecosystems, and shows that doing so yields intriguing insights into this emerging field of research.