Coalition for a Healthier Community: Lessons learned and implications for future work

The Coalition for a Healthier Community (CHC) initiative was implemented to improve the health and well-being of women and girls. Underpinning CHC is a gender-based focus that uses a network of community partners working collaboratively to generate relevant behavior change and improved health outcomes. Ten programs are trying to determine whether gender-focused system approaches are cost-effective ways to address health disparities in women and girls. Programs implemented through coalitions made up of academic institutions, public health departments, community-based organizations, and local, regional, and national organizations, are addressing health issues such as domestic violence, cardiovascular disease prevention, physical activity, and healthy eating. Although these programs are ongoing, they have made significant progress. Key factors contributing to their early success include a comprehensive needs assessment, robust coalitions, the diversity of populations targeted, programs based on findings of the needs assessments, evaluations taking into consideration the effect of gender, and strong academic–community partnerships. A noteworthy impact of these programs has been their ability to shape and impact public, social, and health policies at the state and local levels. However, there have been challenges associated with the implementation of such a complex program. Lessons learned are discussed in this paper.     

An approximation of logarithmic functions in the regression setting

We consider a method of moments approach for dealing with censoring at zero for data expressed in levels when researchers would like to take logarithms. A Box–Cox transformation is employed. We explore this approach in the context of linear regression where both dependent and independent variables are censored. We contrast this method to two others, (1) dropping records of data containing censored values and (2) assuming normality for censored observations and the residuals in the model. Across the methods considered, where researchers are interested primarily in the slope parameter, estimation bias is consistently reduced using the method of moments approach.     

乔伊斯的文学实验精神在小说整体布局中的体现

爱尔兰著名作家詹姆斯·乔伊斯在其文学作品创作过程中始终追求艺术形式的创新.作为20世纪初现代主义文学倾向的代表人物,乔伊斯在小说<一个青年艺术家的肖像>中大胆突破传统,以强烈的文学实验精神将其创作理论应用到实际创作中.以时间、意识和技巧为创作中心,生动展示了主人公斯蒂芬·迪达勒斯的现代精神气质.本文以其代表作小说<一个青年艺术家的肖像>为实例,旨在从两个方面展示乔伊斯的文学实验精神,即乔伊斯美学理论在实际创作中的应用以及其现代主义创作技巧在体现小说整体布局中的作用.     

Book Reviews

Books reviewed:
M Hollander and D Wolfe, Nonparametric Statistical Methods
T Leonard and J.S.J Hsu, Bayesian Methods     

Deconvolution with supersmooth distributions

Nonparametric deconvolution problems require one to recover an unknown density when the data are contaminated with errors. Optimal global rates of convergence are found under the weighted L_p-loss (1 ≤ p ≤ ∞). It appears that the optimal rates of convergence are extremely low for supersmooth error distributions. To resolve this difficulty, we examine how high the noise level can be for deconvolution to be feasible, and for the deconvolution estimate to be as good as the ordinary density estimate. It is shown that if the noise level is not too high, nonparametric Gaussian deconvolution can still be practical. Several simulation studies are also presented.     

Estimation of noncentrality parameters

We propose some estimators of noncentrality parameters which improve upon usual unbiased estimators under quadratic loss. The distributions we consider are the noncentral chi-square and the noncentral F. However, we give more general results for the family of elliptically contoured distributions and propose a robust dominating estimator.     

Real nonparametric regression using complex wavelets

Summary.  Wavelet shrinkage is an effective nonparametric regression technique, especially when the underlying curve has irregular features such as spikes or discontinuities. The basic idea is simple: take the discrete wavelet transform of data consisting of a signal corrupted by noise; shrink or remove the wavelet coefficients to remove the noise; then invert the discrete wavelet transform to form an estimate of the true underlying curve. Various researchers have proposed increasingly sophisticated methods of doing this by using real-valued wavelets. Complex-valued wavelets exist but are rarely used. We propose two new complex-valued wavelet shrinkage techniques: one based on multiwavelet style shrinkage and the other using Bayesian methods. Extensive simulations show that our methods almost always give significantly more accurate estimates than methods based on real-valued wavelets. Further, our multiwavelet style shrinkage method is both simpler and dramatically faster than its competitors. To understand the excellent performance of this method we present a new risk bound on its hard thresholded coefficients.     

亨利·詹姆斯对理想文明的追求

亨利·詹姆斯是美国著名的小说家。他一生关心的是人与人之间的关系。在他横贯两大陆的特殊生活中 ,他发现欧洲代表一种文明 ,美国则代表另一种文明。美国人有很强的道德意识 ,尚未被虚伪诡诈、势利庸俗的世风所玷污 ,但他们诚实的背后却隐藏着无知 ;欧洲有灿烂的文化 ,所以 ,欧洲人有教养 ,有品味 ,但他们却道貌岸然 ,内心充满门第等级、虚荣傲慢等传统偏见。通过新旧两大陆文明的对比 ,詹姆斯试图发现并阐释一种新的文明社会 ,使人类能在更高层面上和谐相处。他对此理想文明社会的探索及追求贯穿于他的主要作品及他的一生。