Errors-in-variables regression using estimated latent variables

This note considers a method for estimating regression parameters from the data containing measurement errors using some natural estimates of the unobserved explanatory variables. It is shown that the resulting estimator is consistent not only in the usual linear regression model but also in the probit model and regression models with censoship or truncation. However, it fails to be consistent in nonlinear regression models except for special cases.     

Ordinary Usage of New Media: Internet Usage via Mobile Phone in Japan

Abstract:  This paper, by analyzing Internet usage via mobile phones in Japan, aims to clarify an aspect of information behavior in present-day Japanese society.
Many discourses on the mobile Internet in Japan, either positive or negative, emphasize its novelty and describe this new media as an exotic phenomenon. These discourses can be divided into two categories. The nationalistic discourses and the moral panic discourses. Both types of discourse have built certain images of social influences of the mobile Internet in the future. However, it would be unwise to conclude that those images of the mobile Internet express the reality of this new medium, simply because they lack empirical ground.
With these points in mind, based on the result of our national survey conducted in 2001, we would like to show the actual status of use of the mobile Internet and discuss that the ordinary usage is a critically important realm to understand the process of social reception of the mobile Internet. As our data shows, although the actual usage of the mobile Internet is not very conspicuous, it gives us a chance to understand how the mobile Internet has been integrated into our everyday lives.     

Errors-in-variables regression using estimated latent variables

This note considers a method for estimating regression parameters from the data containing measurement errors using some natural estimates of the unobserved explanatory variables. It is shown that the resulting estimator is consistent not only in the usual linear regression model but also in the probit model and regression models with censoship or truncation. However, it fails to be consistent in nonlinear regression models except for special cases.     

Strength-training behavior and perceived environment among Japanese older adults

The authors examined the relationship between strength-training behavior and perceived environment in older Japanese adults. An Internet-based survey was conducted of 293 adults age 68.2 ± 2.8 yr. The dependent variable was regular strength-training behavior. The IPAQ environment module, access to facilities for strength training, and home equipment for strength training were environmental factors. Logistic-regression analysis was employed. After demographic variables (gender, age, educational background, household income, body-mass index, self-rated health status, smoking habit, and residential area) were adjusted for, home equipment for strength training (OR = 2.14, 95% CI = 1.50-3.06), access to facilities for strength training (OR = 2.53, 95% CI = 1.32-4.85), and observing active people (OR = 2.20, 95% CI = 1.06-4.58) were positively correlated with regular strength-training behavior. In conclusion, environmental factors associated with strength-training behavior were access to facilities for strength training, having home equipment for strength training, and observing active people.     

Decomposition of Seasonality and Long‐term Trend in Seismological Data: A Bayesian Modelling of Earthquake Detection Capability

This study demonstrates the decomposition of seasonality and long‐term trend in seismological data observed at irregular time intervals. The decomposition was applied to the estimation of earthquake detection capability using cubic B‐splines and a Bayesian approach, which is similar to the seasonal adjustment model frequently used to analyse economic time‐series data. We employed numerical simulation to verify the method and then applied it to real earthquake datasets obtained in and around the northern Honshu island, Japan. With this approach, we obtained the seasonality of the detection capability related to the annual variation of wind speed and the long‐term trend corresponding to the recent improvement of the seismic network in the studied region.     

A Study of the Properties of the Item Count Technique

The item count technique is an indirect questioning techniquethat is used to estimate the proportion of people who have engagedin stigmatizing behavior. This technique is expected to yielda more appropriate estimate than the ordinary direct questioningtechnique because it requests respondents to indicate, basedon a list of several items, simply the number of items thatare applicable to them, including the target key item. An experimentalweb survey was conducted in an attempt to compare the directquestioning technique and the item count technique. Comparedwith the direct questioning technique, the item count techniqueyielded higher estimates of the proportion of shoplifters bynearly 10 percentage points, whereas the difference betweenthe estimates using these two techniques was mostly insignificantwith respect to innocuous blood donation. The survey resultssuggest that in the item count technique respondents tend toreport fewer total behaviors compared to the direct questioncase. This tendency is more pronounced in the case of longeritem lists. Three domain estimators for the item count techniquewere compared, and the cross-based method appeared to be themost appropriate method. Large differences in domain estimatesfor shoplifting between the item count and direct questioningtechniques were found among female respondents, middle-agedrespondents, respondents living in urban areas, and highly-educatedrespondents.     

Consequences,opportunities, and Arrovian impossibility theorems with consequentialist domains

We examine the possibility of Arrovian social choice when alternatives consist of outcomes and opportunity sets from which they are chosen. Consequentialism is a choice attitude towards outcomes and opportunities for choice and prioritizes outcomes rather than opportunities for choice. We first propose a sufficient condition for a restricted domain on which Arrow’s impossibility theorem holds. A domain such that there exists a similarity of choice attitudes within consequentialism satisfies the proposed domain condition. We observe that a diversity of choice attitudes within consequentialism is crucial to resolve an Arrovian impossibility, but this resolution is restricted in plausibility.     

Spouses’ time allocation to pro-environmental activities: who is saving the environment at home?

Family members often perform pro-environmental activities in a cooperative manner. We assume there are two decision-makers in a household, and develop an economic model of pro-environmental activities based on the household production framework. Our theoretical analysis shows how the opportunity cost of time, family structure, and environmental concerns affect an individual’s participation in pro-environmental activities. Using data from the Japanese General Social Survey 2002, we conducted an empirical analysis and found that spouses with lower time costs tended to allocate more time to specific pro-environmental activities. It was further revealed that family structure determines participation in pro-environmental activities.     

Acknowledgment of the Editorial Assistants,Book Review Editors,and Associate Editors

Since the extensive work by Burns and Mitchell, many economists have interpreted economic fluctuations in terms of business-cycle phases. Given this, we argue that, in addition to usual model-selection criteria currently used in the profession, the adequacy of a univariate macroeconomic time series model should be based on its ability to replicate two important business-cycle features of the U.S. data—duration and amplitude. We propose several checks for whether univariate statistical models generate business-cycle features observed in U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) and find that many popular nonlinear models for the log of real GDP are no better at replicating the duration and amplitude features of the data than a simple ARIMA(1, 1, 0).