Low dose risk estimation via simultaneous statistical inferences

Summary.  The paper develops and studies simultaneous confidence bounds that are useful for making low dose inferences in quantitative risk analysis. Application is intended for risk assessment studies where human, animal or ecological data are used to set safe low dose levels of a toxic agent, but where study information is limited to high dose levels of the agent. Methods are derived for estimating simultaneous, one-sided, upper confidence limits on risk for end points measured on a continuous scale. From the simultaneous confidence bounds, lower confidence limits on the dose that is associated with a particular risk (often referred to as a bench-mark dose ) are calculated. An important feature of the simultaneous construction is that any inferences that are based on inverting the simultaneous confidence bounds apply automatically to inverse bounds on the bench-mark dose.     

Benchmark Analysis: Shopping with Proper Confidence

We discuss the issue of using benchmark doses for quantifying (excess) risk associated with exposure to environmental hazards. The paradigm of low-dose risk estimation in dose-response modeling is used as the primary application scenario. Emphasis is placed on making simultaneous inferences on benchmark doses when data are in the form of proportions, although the concepts translate easily to other forms of outcome data.     

Economic Reform in the Czech Republic: Economic Strain,Depression, Hostility,and the Difference Gender Makes*

The Czech Republic is changing rapidly and its current economic transformation is a strain on Czech families. In this study, the connection between economic strain and individual well-being is investigated via mailed questionnaires from 234 households in the Czech Republic. For Czech women, depression rises more with economic strain than does hostility, while Czech men become more hostile than depressed in the face of economic strain. For women, social support is a buffer between economic strain and hostility, whereas self-esteem is a buffer for depression. For men, both self-esteem and social support exacerbate hostility in the context of economic strain.     

Effects of Category Order on Answers in Mail and Telephone Surveys1

Abstract Past research suggests that mail surveys encourage a primacy effect, which is a tendency to choose the first answers from a list, whereas telephone surveys encourage a recency effect, a tendency to choose the last answers from a list. This paper summarizes results from 82 new experiments conducted in 12 separate surveys in seven states. Only four of 33 mail survey comparisons exhibited significant primacy effects, while five of 26 experiments in telephone surveys exhibited recency effects. In addition, only three of 23 cross-method comparisons produced a significant primacy/recency effect in the expected manner. The conclusion is that the prevalence of primacy and recency effects has been over-estimated by past research and a new theoretical approach that takes into account multiple causation is needed for examining these effects.     

African American family life in societal context: Crisis and hope

Since 1965 hundreds of articles and books have been published about African American families. Nevertheless, our understanding of these families continues to be limited. There is a tendency to gloss over important within-group differences; thus, monolithic, stereotypic and inaccurance portrayals of Black family life are common. This paper sets aside debates of Black family pathology or viability, focusing instead on these families' essential character. The paper seeks to understand Black families on their own terms, locating them in relevant social, historical, political and cultural contexts. Key empirical patterns and trends reveal dramatic changes in Black family geographic location, headship, quality of life and socioeconomic status since 1950.A complex picture is revealed. There has been gradual but steady overall improvement alongside persistent, extreme racial disparties and pronounced class disparities among Black families. The proposed Black Family Socio-Ecological Context model specifies and connects institutional, interpersonal, environmental, temporal and cultural facts that shape the essential character of Black family life in such a way as to produce characteristics simultaneously shared and idiosyncratic. The model also provides an organized, systematic accounting of research and public policy issues relevant to the study of African American families.An early version co-authored with Richard A. English was presented during the National Council on Family Relations Meetings in Portland, Oregon, October 1980.     

Exploration to Foster Career Development

Responses to the Adult Career Concerns Inventory (ACCI: Super, Thompson, Lindeman, Myers, & Jordaan, 1988) were organized through cluster analysis to identify different ways in which adults use exploratory behavior to cope with career development tasks. Significant differences in life-role salience among the types of adult career explorers identified were also investigated. Findings indicated a variety of ways in which adults use exploratory behavior. However, no significant differences were found in life-role salience among the types of career explorers. The discussion explains how career counselors can interpret their clients' ACCI profiles to select appropriate career interventions.     

Loneliness and Adolescents’ Neural Processing of Self,Friends, and Teachers: Consequences for the School Self‐Concept

The present interdisciplinary study explored whether perceived loneliness is associated with ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vMPFC) activation during self‐ and social judgments (friends and teachers) in adolescents. Moreover, we examined how vMPFC activity is related to the academic self‐concept (ASC). Results of manifest path analysis indicated that high perceived loneliness was related to lower neural response to self‐judgments. In turn, high neural response to self‐judgments was positively associated with the ASC, whereas there was a trendwise negative association between high neural response to teacher‐related judgments and ASC. This study reveals associations between perceived loneliness and neural processing of the self, underlining the idea that feeling isolated from others may hinder self‐insight and, by extension, the formation of a stable academic self‐concept.