Stalking and psychological abuse: common factors and relationship-specific characteristics

The purpose of this study was to refine and elaborate models of personality and relationship-specific characteristics in the perpetration of stalking and psychological abuse. Three hundred and forty-two college students who had been in intimate relationships completed a series of questionnaires about their most recent breakup and their former relationship. Our hypotheses were supported, with harsh parental discipline, anxious attachment, and need for control of one's partner forming a common cluster in the prediction of stalking and psychological abuse. For psychological abuse, relationship dissatisfaction added to the predictive factors; whereas for stalking, the level of anger-jealousy over the breakup was the major added factor. Degree of anger-jealousy was influenced by being the recipient of a breakup and the level of passion.     

Capacity constraints and the dynamics of underwriting profits

The presence of an underwriting profit cycle in property/liability insurance has become a stylized fact. Models of this'underwriting cycle'imply that the insurance market is governed by two regimes, as capacity is constrained or not. We apply the smooth transition regression model to insurance industry data for 1934–1993 to test for a regime shift. We find a rapid shift between two distinct regimes with different dynamics. When capacity is not restricted, we find no evidence of a cycle. The cycle is present in periods when capacity is restricted, immediately following World War II and after 1968. The underwriting cycle appears to be a recent phenomenon.     

The effect of preservation technology investment on a non-instantaneous deteriorating inventory model

Considering an inventory system with a non-instantaneous deteriorating item, our objective is to study the effect of preservation technology investment on inventory decisions. The generalized productivity of invested capital, deterioration and time-depend partial backlogging rates are used to model the inventory system. The basic results of fractional programming are employed to prove the uniqueness of the global maximum for each case. We also establish several structural properties on finding the optimal replenishment and preservation technology strategies. Further, we use a couple of numerical examples to illustrate the results and conclude the paper with suggestions for possible future researches.     

Anger, irrational beliefs, and dysfunctional attitudes in violent dating relationships

The purpose of the present investigation was to evaluate whether perpetrators of dating violence could be differentiated from their nonviolent counterparts on measures of anger and cognitive distortion, specifically Ellis's (1994) irrational beliefs and Beck's (1976) dysfunctional attitudes. Of the 95 male and 152 female undergraduates surveyed, 27% (24 males and 43 females) reported using some form of physical aggression against their current dating partner in the past year. On a self-report measure of anger (State-Trait Anger Expression Inventory), violent individuals reported higher levels of Anger Out and lower levels of Anger Control compared to nonviolent participants. While there were no differences between violent and nonviolent participants' levels of Trait Anger, the results suggest that violent individuals have difficulty controlling angry feelings when they arise, which may increase the likelihood of externally directed forms of anger expression. No significant group differences emerged on questionnaire measures of irrational beliefs and dysfunctional attitudes. Within the violent sample, there was no differential pattern of correlations between measures of anger and cognition relative to the nonviolent sample. The present data suggest that while trait-based measures of cognitive distortion explain little variance in self-reported acts of dating violence, future research should investigate whether (a) cognitive distortions are present during affect-inducing partner conflict situations, or (b) vary with violence severity.     

The effects of smoking laws on seating allocations of restaurants, bars, and taverns

Supporters of smoking laws often argue that they do not harm restaurants, bars, and taverns and may even raise their profits. Opponents argue that owners cater to customer preferences regarding smoking and that laws mandating specific smoking policies will therefore negatively impact profits of some firms. This article tests hypotheses regarding how smoking laws affect seating allocations, using data from a nationwide survey of restaurant and bar owners. The empirical evidence indicates that smoking laws exert no significant effect on seating allocations. Firms are shown to allocate greater shares of seating to nonsmoking use when customers exhibit stronger preferences for such seating.     

自动往返电动小汽车的设计原理与制作方法

本文介绍了采用脉冲主动采集、计数程序控制、虚拟脉冲复位、撞击转向的方式完成自动往返电动小汽车的构思、设计及制作的方法。     

A simple approach to an integrated single-vendor single-buyer inventory system with shortage

In this article, a simple approach with two basic inequalities (Cauchy–Schwarz inequality and arithmetic–geometric mean inequality) is used to solve the integrated single-vendor single-buyer inventory problem developed by Wu and Ouyang (Wu, K.-S. and Ouyang, L.-Y., 2003. An integrated single-vendor single-buyer inventory system with shortage derived algebraically. Production Planning & Control, 14 (6), 555–561). Without the method of completing perfect square, the proposed approach yields the global minimum of the integrated total cost per year more easily than the algebraic approach used by Wu and Ouyang (2003 Wu, K-S and Ouyang, L-Y. 2003. An integrated single-vendor single-buyer inventory system with shortage derived algebraically. Production Planning & Control, 14(6): 555–561. [Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). In addition, for people without the background of calculus, it is more useful to determine the buyer's economic order quantity and the vendor's optimal number of deliveries.     

Use of a case study in sequencing/scheduling research

This paper describes a study of an industrial sequencing/scheduling problem. The study contains the definition of the problem, data requirements and examination of solution technique. Definition of the problem is discussed from the aspect of uniqueness of the specific system. Discussion of data requirements includes availability and accuracy, while examination of solution technique considers limitation of time, computer capacity, etc., as well as the possibility of imbedding available algorithms into the solution procedure. Conclusions are presented relative to the use of the case study approach in sequencing/scheduling research.