Results of a Heart Disease Risk-Factor Screening Among Traditional College Students

Abstract

Biological, behavioral, and psychosocial contributions to the gender gap in coronary heart disease (CHD) are discussed. Although CHD is the Number 1 cause of death for both sexes in the industrialized world, CHD mortality rates between these countries are larger than those between men and women, suggesting that biological factors are not the sole influences on the gender gap in CHD. Traditional coronary risk factors cannot explain the rapid increase in CHD mortality among middle-aged men in many of the newly independent states of eastern Europe. However, eastern European men score higher on stress-related psychosocial coronary risk factors (eg, social isolation, vital exhaustion) than men living in the West. Comparisons between the sexes also reveal gender differences in psychosocial and behavioral coronary risk factors, including excessive alcohol consumption and smoking, favoring women. Overall, it appears that men's coping with stressful events may be less adaptive physiologically, behaviorally, and emotionally, contributing to their increased risk for CHD.     

An intelligent dynamic simulation model for designing software development processes

This paper describes a computer-aided software development process design. This is a computerized intelligent tool designed to aid managers of software development projects in planning, managing and controlling the development process of medium to large scale software projects. The application of this computerized tool should help reduce the uncertainties involved in the budget, personnel and schedule planning of software development projects.     

Why do men get more heart disease than women? An international perspective

Biological, behavioral, and psychosocial contributions to the gender gap in coronary heart disease (CHD) are discussed. Although CHD is the Number 1 cause of death for both sexes in the industrialized world, CHD mortality rates between these countries are larger than those between men and women, suggesting that biological factors are not the sole influences on the gender gap in CHD. Traditional coronary risk factors cannot explain the rapid increase in CHD mortality among middle-aged men in many of the newly independent states of eastern Europe. However, eastern European men score higher on stress-related psychosocial coronary risk factors (e.g., social isolation, vital exhaustion) than men living in the West. Comparisons between the sexes also reveal gender differences in psychosocial and behavioral coronary risk factors, including excessive alcohol consumption and smoking, favoring women. Overall, it appears that men's coping with stressful events may be less adaptive physiologically, behaviorally, and emotionally, contributing to their increased risk for CHD.     

Linear Regression for Panel With Unknown Number of Factors as Interactive Fixed Effects

In this paper, we study the least squares (LS) estimator in a linear panel regression model with unknown number of factors appearing as interactive fixed effects. Assuming that the number of factors used in estimation is larger than the true number of factors in the data, we establish the limiting distribution of the LS estimator for the regression coefficients as the number of time periods and the number of cross‐sectional units jointly go to infinity. The main result of the paper is that under certain assumptions, the limiting distribution of the LS estimator is independent of the number of factors used in the estimation as long as this number is not underestimated. The important practical implication of this result is that for inference on the regression coefficients, one does not necessarily need to estimate the number of interactive fixed effects consistently.     

Domestic violence cases involving children: effects of an evidence-based prosecution approach

This article reports findings from the evaluation of a city-county criminal prosecution unit for domestic violence involving children. Data from 446 cases prosecuted in the first 2 years of the Joint Prosecution Unit (JPU) were compared to a matched group of 446 domestic abuse cases prosecuted by both the city and county attorneys' offices in the 2 years prior to inception of the JPU. Results of the comparisons indicated that fewer cases were declined or dismissed by the new unit, and that cases were prosecuted at a significantly more stringent level. Multinomial logistic regression analysis indicated that child and weapon factors were associated with increased likelihood of a more serious (i.e., felony) plea for the new prosecution unit, relative to the comparison group. Results are presented in the context of addressing the difficulties inherent in the prosecution of domestic abuse and in light of the increasing awareness of the detrimental effects of domestic violence on children.