Survival and lifetime data analysis with a flexible class of distributions

We introduce a general class of continuous univariate distributions with positive support obtained by transforming the class of two-piece distributions. We show that this class of distributions is very flexible, easy to implement, and contains members that can capture different tail behaviours and shapes, producing also a variety of hazard functions. The proposed distributions represent a flexible alternative to the classical choices such as the log-normal, Gamma, and Weibull distributions. We investigate empirically the inferential properties of the proposed models through an extensive simulation study. We present some applications using real data in the contexts of time-to-event and accelerated failure time models. In the second kind of applications, we explore the use of these models in the estimation of the distribution of the individual remaining life.     

How biology became social,and what it means for social theory

In this paper I first offer a systematic outline of a series of conceptual novelties in the life‐sciences that have favoured, over the last three decades, the emergence of a more social view of biology. I focus in particular on three areas of investigation: (1) technical changes in evolutionary literature that have provoked a rethinking of the possibility of altruism, morality and prosocial behaviours in evolution; (2) changes in neuroscience, from an understanding of the brain as an isolated data processor to the ultrasocial and multiply connected social brain of contemporary neuroscience; and (3) changes in molecular biology, from the view of the gene as an autonomous master of development to the ‘reactive genome’ of the new emerging field of molecular epigenetics. In the second section I reflect on the possible implications for the social sciences of this novel biosocial terrain and argue that the postgenomic language of extended epigenetic inheritance and blurring of the nature/nurture boundaries will be as provocative for neo‐Darwinism as it is for the social sciences as we have known them. Signs of a new biosocial language are emerging in several social‐science disciplines and this may represent an exciting theoretical novelty for twenty‐first social theory.     

墓券与东汉民众的生死观念

东汉时期的世俗民众没有认识到人终有一死的本质特性,反而抗拒死亡,渴求长寿永生。当年寿久长的愿望破灭时,他们又深信异象生命自然会在幽界冥府绵延不绝。不过生者却刻意疏远逝者,直接把殁亡人遣送到彼岸世界,希求幽鬼永居墓穴,接受冥府行政官僚体制和宗族观念的管制和束缚,按照世人的要求和期望去经历冥府生活。     

教育民主的内涵、路径及限度

教育是实现民主社会最根本、最有效的途径，民主是教育的基本原则。学校是民主社会的“雏形共同体”，民主生活是学校日常化的生活方式。教育目的是民主，是培养共同体生活的民主社会的公民，教育过程、手段和方法等也都应该是民主的，通过非民主的方式实现民主，这既不可取也不可能。当前我们应该创造公平的受教育机会，剔除教学中专制的形式权威，消解教育管理中的命令化和行政化方式，促进教育走向民主，社会走向和谐。     

The Relationships between Activity and Quality of Life for Older Men and Women at Different Ages in Taiwan

This study investigated the relationships between types of activity and quality of life (QOL) for older men and women at different ages. Based on cross-sectional data that included 220 community-dwelling elderly persons aged 65 and older in southern Taiwan, the results showed that the participation rates in many activities declined with age for both genders. Social activity and solitary leisure activity were significantly associated with QOL for old-old men, but not for young-old men. Only social activity was significantly associated with QOL for young-old women, but there was no significant association between any activity and QOL for old-old women.     

Feeling disability: theories of affect and critical disability studies

This paper explores connections between affect studies and critical disability studies. Our interest in affect is sparked by the beginnings of a new research project that seeks to illuminate the lives, hopes and desires of young people with ‘life-limiting’ or ‘life-threatening’ impairments. Cultural responses to these young people are shaped by dominant discourses associated with lives lived well and long. Before commencing our empirical work with young people we use this paper to think through how we might conceptualise affect and disability. We present three themes; ontological invalidation in neoliberal-able times; affect aliens and crip killjoys; disability and resistant assemblages.     

Ethical living: relinking ethics and consumption through care in Chile and Brazil

Mainstream conceptualizations of ‘ethical consumption’ equate the notion with conscious, individual, market‐mediated choices motivated by ethical or political aims that transcend ordinary concerns. Drawing on recent sociology and anthropology of consumption literature on the links between ordinary ethics and ethical consumption, this article discusses some of the limitations of this conceptualization. Using data from 32 focus groups conducted in Chile and Brazil, we propose a conceptualization of ethical consumption that does not centre on individual, market‐mediated choices but understands it at the level of practical outcomes, which we refer to as different forms of ‘ethical living’. To do that, we argue, we need to depart from the deontological understanding of ethics that underpins mainstream approaches to ethical consumption and adopt a more consequentialist view focusing on ethical outcomes. We develop these points through describing one particular ordinary moral regime that seemed to be predominant in participants’ accounts of ethics and consumption in both Chile and Brazil: one that links consumption and ethics through care. We show that the moral regime of care leads to ‘ethical outcomes’, such as energy saving or limiting overconsumption, yet contrary to the mainstream view of ethical consumption emphasizing politicized choice expressed through markets, these result from following ordinary ethics, often through routines of practices.     

社会性别意识的构成及影响因素分析——以福建省厦门市的调查为例

本文以福建省厦门市的调查数据为依据,通过因子分析方法研究社会性别意识的构成因素。回归分析结果表明,两性在对待女性的压制态度和倾斜态度上存在相当大的性别差异,年龄、受教育程度、个人经济收入和婚姻关系等都对性别意识的不同方面产生不同程度的影响。构建和谐的性别关系,不仅需要增强文化和性别意识教育,在发挥女性主体意识的同时,也要让男性更充分地认识和肯定女性的价值,此外,还要进一步发挥公共决策在维护妇女权益和实现男女平等中的作用。     

Impact of Gender Binarism on Hijras’ Life Course and Their Access to Fundamental Human Rights in Pakistan

This study adds to the growing body of knowledge on gender nonconformity aspects of heteronormativity by examining its impact on the life course of hijras and their access to fundamental human rights in Pakistan. Drawing on 50 semistructured interviews conducted in two sites, the findings suggest that the participants’ lived experiences associated with gender nonconformity significantly influenced the direction of their life course and their ability to have access to human rights. These experiences spanned from childhood to elderhood across a wide range of settings, such as family, school, guru dera (residence headed by a hijra guru), workplace, and interactions with authorities. The participants’ human rights were not recognized, resulting in abuse, social stigma, discrimination against them, and their exclusion from mainstream society. Finally, implications are drawn for public policy and future research on third gender concerns in Pakistan and elsewhere.     

苗延秀、包玉堂的生命意识对革命文学的贡献

由于政治环境、文艺政策等多方面的影响,新中国成立后的革命文学创作大多趋于模式化、程式化。时代环境无法改变,革命文学作家们也就无法完全摆脱主流意识的影响,但是广西当代少数民族革命文学作家苗延秀、包玉堂将自身的生命意识融入革命文学创作之中,在一定程度上使其作品呈现出有别于主流话语的独特抒写空间。他们在原生态的浪漫抒写、女性个体表现、民族民间化等方面对革命文学做出了特殊贡献。