Impacts of Sense of Community and Satisfaction with Governmental Recovery on Psychological Status of the Wenchuan Earthquake Survivors

This research examined the impacts of sense of community and satisfaction with governmental recovery on life satisfaction and depression of the Wenchuan earthquake survivors. A total of 304 valid questionnaires were collected. Bivariate analysis indicated that both sense of community and satisfaction with governmental recovery were correlated significantly with both life satisfaction and depression. Regression analyses showed that the variables of sense of community and satisfaction with governmental recovery were only associated significantly with life satisfaction, controlling socio-demographic and other variables. The research highlighted the importance to examine both positive and negative aspects of psychological status of disaster survivors and to include the factors related to community and social policies in examining their psychological status. Limitation and direction of future studies were address. The implications of the research were discussed in China’s social and political contexts.     

The exact proability that the roots of quadratic,cubic, and quartic equations are all real if the equation coefficients are random

Suppose that the coefficients of a polynomial equation are Independent random variables defined on subsets of real numbers, The purpose of this paper is to find the exact probability that all roots of a random polynomial equation are real. Since a polynomial equation of degree higher than four with arbitrary coefficients cannot be solved algrebraically, this paper will consider quadratic, cubic and quartic equations only. The general results are obtained in each case, Also, a number of special cases are furnished.     

Urbanization and Land‐Use Change: A Human Ecology of Deforestation Across the United States, 2001–2006

Drawing from human ecology, the present study sheds light on the ways in which urbanization drives changes in forest cover at the local level across the continental United States. Using county‐level data from the National Land Cover Database and other US governmental sources, the area of forest cover lost in the construction of the built environment between 2001 and 2006 is regressed on the size, density, and social organization of a locality. Controlling for several other factors, estimates from spatial regression models with two‐way fixed effects show that increasing density slowed down deforestation, while variables representing size and social organization had the opposite effect. Based on these results, urbanization is framed as a multidimensional human ecological process with countervailing impacts on the natural environment.     

Binary Time Series Modeling with Application to Adhesion Frequency Experiments

Repeated adhesion frequency assay is the only published method for measuring the kinetic rates of cell adhesion. Cell adhesion plays an important role in many physiological and pathological processes. Traditional analysis of adhesion frequency experiments assumes that the adhesion test cycles are independent Bernoulli trials. This assumption can often be violated in practice. Motivated by the analysis of repeated adhesion tests, a binary time series model incorporating random effects is developed in this paper. A goodness-of-fit statistic is introduced to assess the adequacy of distribution assumptions on the dependent binary data with random effects. The asymptotic distribution of the goodness-of-fit statistic is derived and its finite-sample performance is examined via a simulation study. Application of the proposed methodology to real data from a T-cell experiment reveals some interesting information, including the dependency between repeated adhesion tests.     

Familywise robustness criteria for multiple-comparison procedures

A criticism of multiple-comparison procedures is that the family of inferences over which an error rate is controlled is often arbitrarily selected, yet the conclusion may depend heavily on the choice of the family. Such ambiguity is most likely in large exploratory studies requiring numerous simultaneous inferences. In ambiguous situations it is desirable that results of multiple-comparison procedures depend little on the chosen family. To assess this, we propose several familywise robustness criteria to evaluate such procedures, and we find some of their properties theoretically and by simulation. Procedures that control the false discovery rate seem to be familywise robust.     

Liquidity spreads in the corporate bondmarket: Estimation using a semi-parametric model

This study utilizes the liquidity risk associated with Treasury bonds to directly determine the degree to which liquidity spreads account for corporate bond spreads. This enhances understanding of their relative contributions to the yield spreads of corporate bonds. To capture time variation on instantaneous spreads and volatility and to reduce modeling bias, semi-parametric techniques are applied to estimate the time-varying intensity process. Empirical results indicate that our semi-parametric model is good at capturing the time variation in default and liquidity intensity processes. The credit spreads are due to default risk and reflect the relative liquidity of the corporate bond market, indicating that liquidity risk plays an important role in corporate bond valuation.     

Clustering algorithm for proximity-relation matrix and its applications

In this paper, we present a new algorithm for clustering proximity-relation matrix that does not require the transitivity property. The proposed algorithm is first inspired by the idea of Yang and Wu [16] then turned into a self-organizing process that is built upon the intuition behind clustering. At the end of the process subjects belonging to be the same cluster should converge to the same point, which represents the cluster center. However, the performance of Yang and Wu's algorithm depends on parameter selection. In this paper, we use the partition entropy (PE) index to choose it. Numerical result illustrates that the proposed method does not only solve the parameter selection problem but also obtains an optimal clustering result. Finally, we apply the proposed algorithm to three applications. One is to evaluate the performance of higher education in Taiwan, another is machine–parts grouping in cellular manufacturing systems, and the other is to cluster probability density functions.     

The Influence of College Tuition and Fees on Fertility Rate in Taiwan

This study investigates the influence of college tuition and fees (CTF) on fertility behavior as a mechanism to induce population growth. Using a fixed-effect regression model with various specifications of the fertility equation on contiguous panel data for the period 1990–2001, this study has determined of that CTF has a significantly negative influence on regional GFR (general fertility rate) in Taiwan. In addition, unemployment rates also have a negative impact on fertility though the male rate plays a greater role in the fertility decision than the female rate. Finally, this study calculates the cost in terms of CTF to the Central Government to induce population growth. For a 1% decrease in real CTF, the cost to the government and taxpayers at large, the cost of each additional child will range from US$90.31 to US$252.23 depending on the years considered and the model specifications.

Repositioning Risk in Social Work Education: Reflections Arising from the Threat of SARS to Social Work Students in Hong Kong during their Field Practicum

The social work profession has always been involved in dealing with uncertainty and risk in the life politics of clients. However, it is not easy for young social work students to translate this philosophical disposition into their real life practice with clients. In spring 2003, when the SARS epidemic broke out in Hong Kong, a group of social work students from the Chinese University of Hong Kong were doing their fieldwork practicum. Suddenly confronted by a collective sense of risk in their role as social workers, the students went through a period of unrest, as performing their helping duties brought with it a simultaneous exposure to personal risk. This paper is based on four focus group interviews with these social work students, to understand how they processed their experience of risk during their exposure to the SARS crisis, and how they connected the experience to their social work practice with clients. It is found that the predicament arising from the exposure to personal risk brought about by the SARS crisis during the students' field placement engendered the reflective process that enabled a renewed and personalized meaning of professionalism. The results provide a basis for reflection among social work educators on the role of risk in the training of prospective social workers, and on how social work education can better prepare students for practice in a high‐risk environment.     

Associations Between Sexual Abuse and Negative Health Consequences Among High-Risk Men Who Have Sex with Men

This study evaluated whether a history of sexual abuse could differentiate negative health consequences among men who have sex with men (MSM; N = 148) enrolled in a risk counseling program. More than half (51.4%) reported an experience of sexual abuse. A history of sexual abuse was associated with increased psychological distress, increased rates of alcohol (AOR = 2.91; p <.01) and/or drug abuse (AOR = 2; p <.01) treatment, increased risk of housing instability (AOR = 2.13; p <.05), and increased risk for suicidality (AOR = 4.3; p <.001). Findings demonstrate that screening for sexual abuse may be useful in determining the service needs of high-risk MSM.