A simulation study of the operations of a telephone bureau

This paper presents a priority queueing situation: a telephone bureau which has to deal with two distinct classes of caller. The first group are making urgent calls which must be dealt with as soon as possible, while the second group are making a variety of different types of routine enquiry which are not considered to be as important. Management are concerned with a number of issues associated with the operations of their bureau, these include the levels of service offered to the different groups of caller, the effects of different levels of staffing, and the effects of changing the mix of call types. The use of applied probability theory to analyse this situation is briefly discussed, and then simulation proposed as a means to analyse the operations of the bureau. The development of this simulation is outlined, some typical results presented and its usefulness discussed.     

‘Something sensational…* The sexual diary as a tool for mapping detailed sexual behaviour

Reliable information about the detail and context of sexual behaviour is crucial for describing high-risk behaviours for the transmission of Aids/HIV, and for estimating parameters of epidemiological models. It is possible to adapt the method of systematic diary-keeping to this end and develop a tool which is also close to the subject's conceptions of the ‘chunks’ of sexual behaviour. The structure of reports of sexual behaviour is viewed as akin to linguistic structure, with a basic unit of the sexual act built into a ‘session’. Such structure leads naturally to a coding system which allows natural language accounts to be represented symbolically, and parsed and analysed formally. The coded version is easily learnt and used, and is incomprehensible to outsiders. Examples are given of its use to collect systematic data on homosexual and bisexual behaviour.     

The Mapping of family-composition preferences: A scaling analysis

When subjects express preference for one type of family composition over another, their judgments have the useful property that they can be referred to the ‘objective’ characteristics defining the stimuli. Pair comparison preference data from the Bollen-Delbeke study are “internally” analyzed according to the Carroll-Chang “Points of View” vector model and Coombs' Unfolding (distance) model. The distance model was found to give a better fit. Secondly, the models are compared within the framework of Carroll's Preference Mapping hierarchy of models, referring the data to the ‘objective’ structure underlying the stimuli. The simple distance model is found to give a much better fit.The methodological and substantive implications of this finding are discussed.¹     

Unwanted sexual experiences and sexual risks in gay and bisexual men: Associations among revictimization,substance use,and psychiatric symptoms

The data set of 2,182 gay/bisexual men's month‐long sexual diaries collected by the United Kingdom Socio‐sexual Investigations of Gay Men and Aids (Project SIGMA) was used to analyse the extent to which acts of anal intercourse (AI) are distributed among gay men, using the Lorenz/Gini methodology for measuring concentration. Most individuals (60%) who engage in AI do so only once or twice a month, but there is a long tail of those who do it much more. In terms of the amount of AI acts, one tenth of the individuals are performing half of the acts of AI. The Gini coefficient of concentration is high (0.55). Factors most affecting rates and concentration of risk behaviour include relationship status, HIV sero‐status and concordant/discordant partner status.     

The application of microcomputers in production management

The findings reported result from a questionnaire survey, and a number of company interviews. Further questions which need to be answered are identified, and a research project to provide these answers is outlined.     

The use of formal inventory control models: A preliminary survey

Of the many papers and texts on the subject of inventory control, relatively few report the successful implementation of systems based on formal mathematical models developed with specific objectives in mind. This could be considered rather strange in the light of the relatively high number of papers reporting the development of models for dealing with a multitude of different hypothetical situations, and the widespread availability of computer systems capable of exploiting such models. Various reasons for this anomaly can be put forward. This paper reports the results of a preliminary survey designed to investigate this more deeply, and draws some necessarily tentative conclusions relating to factors contributing to the successful application of such systems.     

Seeking to Engage ‘Hard‐to‐Reach’ Families: Towards a Transferable Model of Intervention

This paper describes an exploratory evaluation of the Peers Early Education Partnership ‘Room to Play’, an innovative and experimental ‘drop‐in’ service seeking to attract and engage ‘hard‐to‐reach’ families in one of the most deprived areas of a Midlands city. Located in a shop unit of a busy community shopping centre, it offers play and learning activities for children, and provides opportunities for parents to talk to practitioners in a neutral and supportive environment. Through a mixed methods design, the authors attempted to document the core components of a potential transferable model of intervention, within challenging research constraints.