An improved comorbidity summary score for measuring disease burden and predicting mortality with applications to two national cohorts

Abstract

Research involving administrative healthcare data to study patient outcomes requires the investigator to account for the patient’s disease burden in order to reduce the potential for biased results. Here we develop a comorbidity summary score based on variable importance measures derived from several statistical and machine learning methods and show it has superior predictive performance to the Elixhauser and Charlson indices when used to predict 1-year, 5-year, and 10-year mortality. We used two large Veterans Administration cohorts to develop and validate the summary score and compared predictive performance using the area under ROC curve (AUC) and the Brier score.     

Accuracy,confidence and consensus in bayesian hypothesis inference

Interest centres on a group of statisticians , each supplied with the same n sample datapoint sandmaking formal Bayesian inference with a common likelihood function but differing prior knowledge and utility functions.

Definitions are proposed which quantify, in a commensurable way, the inference processes of “accuracy”, “confidence” and “consensus” for the case of hypothesis inference with a fixed sample size n.

The general significance of comparing the three quantifiers is considered. As n increases the asymptotic behaviour of the quantifiers is evaluated and it is found that the three rates of convergence are of the same order as a function of n. The results are interpreted and some of their implications are discussed.     

An Algorithm for Unconstrained Quadratically Penalized Convex Optimization

Estimators are often defined as the solutions to data dependent optimization problems. A common form of objective function (function to be optimized) that arises in statistical estimation is the sum of a convex function V and a quadratic complexity penalty. A standard paradigm for creating kernel-based estimators leads to such an optimization problem. This article describes an optimization algorithm designed for unconstrained optimization problems in which the objective function is the sum of a non negative convex function and a known quadratic penalty. The algorithm is described and compared with BFGS on some penalized logistic regression and penalized L ^3/2 regression problems.     

彝族传统民歌与流行音乐交汇的时代文化记忆研究

彝族传统民歌与流行音乐的交汇,影响了彝族时代文化记忆的表述。通过对彝族传统民歌与彝族流行音乐作比发现,不论是传统民歌,还是流行音乐,都体现了民族的时代思考与文化智慧。彝族传统民歌以生产生活和神话、历史等为基础进行编唱,倾向于描述场景或民俗文化,进而表达感情。彝族流行音乐则以传统文化为引,吸纳时代文化元素,借用流行音乐的要素创作,形成新型彝族民歌。在数智时代背景下,传统民歌与流行民歌呈现受众广、传播路径多元、形式多样等特点,并共同传唱民族文化。由此,彝族传统民歌与现代流行音乐的交汇,丰富了民歌的形式,影响了民族文化的时代表达。     

毕摩特依·毕摩·毕——基于卡塔西斯谱系的辨识

毕摩特依是毕摩沿袭“残缺”传统的“书写”作品,具有诗性的特质,其所指是通过“毕”这个“说唱艺术”的能指实现的。因此,毕摩特依、毕摩、毕三者只有共在,才能构成一个完整的模仿或叙事方式的“说唱”场域,各异的毕摩、毕摩特依、毕的组合凭借各自的结构力量占据空间、决定运作逻辑。“卡塔西斯”（Catharsis）,作为亚里士多德《诗学》的叙事功能,依之可以理解与解释毕摩特依、毕摩、毕共在中聚焦于伦理、心理、宗教等视域的“净化”“陶冶”“疏泄”——即“卡塔西斯”的场和力。     

社会转型背景下凉山彝族传统婚姻文化变迁研究

从“整体主义”视角出发,综合观念、制度、礼仪、行为等方面视凉山彝族婚姻文化为一个有机整体,将其置于凉山彝族社会转型的特定背景进行观照。基于现有婚姻文化研究成果,梳理中华人民共和国成立以来特别是本世纪以来凉山彝族婚姻文化的变迁脉络与变迁内容,分析变迁中出现的积极趋势与负面问题,形成对凉山彝族传统婚姻文化及其变迁的整体性认识,为凉山涉及婚姻文化的移风易俗治理实践提供参考。     

Semiparametric estimation of plane similarities: application to fast computation of aeronautic loads

In the big data era, it is often needed to resolve the problem of parsimonious data representation. In this paper, the data under study are curves and the sparse representation is based on a semiparametric model. Indeed, we propose an original registration model for noisy curves. The model is built transforming an unknown function by plane similarities. We develop a statistical method that allows to estimate the parameters characterizing the plane similarities. The properties of the statistical procedure are studied. We show the convergence and the asymptotic normality of the estimators. Numerical simulations and a real-life aeronautic example illustrate and demonstrate the strength of our methodology.     

Learning in and from projects: the learning modes and a learning capability model

Abstract

The notion of ‘project delivery’ is well embedded in and across the management and organizational sciences literature – generating a narrative that reflects and recognizes the instrumental nature of projects and programmes in strategy execution. Project management, as a distinct and well-established body of research enquiry, has increasingly sought to focus our attention on the impacts of complexity, risk and uncertainty in projects; the corollary being a desideratum to strengthen our theoretical understanding of how insight and learning from projects may influence improvements to organizational efficiency. The wider literature suggests that organizational learning remains a challenging proposition, particularly in the context of organizations operating in environments of high complexity. In this paper, we enhance the conversation on organizational learning through a series of case studies, generating evidence of thirteen ‘learning modes’. The paper proposes that mature organizations tend to exhibit a greater number of learning modes and that there is a tendency to capture and socialize knowledge with a greater emphasis on the context of the learning situation rather than the learning artefact in isolation. The empirical evidence gathered in this paper forms the basis of a capability model, characterized by the thirteen modes of learning. The model intimates that learning occurs, and is more effective, when knowledge and information are enacted in practice through the learning modes which form a nucleus of the organizational learning capability. The research concludes with a 'call to action' that emphasizes the strategic importance of learning practices and routines in project oriented-organizations.     

A user’s guide to Lisbon: mobilities,spatial apprenticeship and migrant urban integration*

This paper engages with the ‘mobility turn’ scholarship in order to provide tools for the study of migrants’ integration to urban space. The analysis of urban mobilities draws attention to the practical know-how that underlies mobility practices. I argue that migrants’ urban apprenticeship – that is, the ways migrants learn (to use) city spaces – shape their access to urban resources and their participation in urban life. Based on fieldwork conducted in Lisbon, Portugal, I explore how migrants’ urban knowledges play out in their everyday practices and resonate with broader concerns over migrant integration.     

Overcoming barriers: engaging younger students in an online intercultural exchange

This paper reports on a small-scale project involving an online school exchange between two classes of 12-/13-year olds located in the North of England and the Ruhr area of Germany. The overarching aim of the project was to develop intercultural understanding in foreign language learning through communication in an online environment. Analysing data from website posts, lesson observations, student questionnaires and interviews, the paper investigates the extent to which the project realised this goal, and examines emerging practical and pedagogical issues. Comparing the processes and outcomes of this project in secondary education to similar projects in Higher Education (HE), the research found that the young people learnt more than older students about cultural similarities than differences. They were thus less likely to be party to cultural misunderstandings, developing friendly relationships and openness towards a people of a different culture. However, their failure to notice differences may have been due to a lack of in-depth discussion and absence of more demanding student tasks. The paper concludes that in order to develop more sophisticated intercultural learning, expertise derived from telecollaboration in HE needs to be adapted to the lower secondary school context, drawing particularly on auto-ethnography and ethnographic interviewing.