Translating cross-lagged effects into incidence rates and risk ratios: The case of psychosocial safety climate and depression

Longitudinal studies are the gold standard of empirical work and stress research whenever experiments are not plausible. Frequently, scales are used to assess risk factors and their consequences, and cross-lagged effects are estimated to determine possible risks. Methods to translate cross-lagged effects into risk ratios to facilitate risk assessment do not yet exist, which creates a divide between psychological and epidemiological work stress research. The aim of the present paper is to demonstrate how cross-lagged effects can be used to assess the risk ratio of different levels of psychosocial safety climate (PSC) in organisations, an important psychosocial risk for the development of depression. We used available longitudinal evidence from the Australian Workplace Barometer (N?=?1905) to estimate cross-lagged effects of PSC on depression. We applied continuous time modelling to obtain time-scalable cross effects. These were further investigated in a 4-year Monte Carlo simulation, which translated them into 4-year incident rates. Incident rates were determined by relying on clinically relevant 2-year periods of depression. We suggest a critical value of PSC?=?26 (corresponding to ?1.4 SD), which is indicative of more than 100% increased incidents of persistent depressive disorder in 4-year periods compared to average levels of PSC across 4 years.     

Lognormal Approximations of Fault Tree Uncertainty Distributions

Fault trees are used in reliability modeling to create logical models of fault combinations that can lead to undesirable events. The output of a fault tree analysis (the top event probability) is expressed in terms of the failure probabilities of basic events that are input to the model. Typically, the basic event probabilities are not known exactly, but are modeled as probability distributions: therefore, the top event probability is also represented as an uncertainty distribution. Monte Carlo methods are generally used for evaluating the uncertainty distribution, but such calculations are computationally intensive and do not readily reveal the dominant contributors to the uncertainty. In this article, a closed‐form approximation for the fault tree top event uncertainty distribution is developed, which is applicable when the uncertainties in the basic events of the model are lognormally distributed. The results of the approximate method are compared with results from two sampling‐based methods: namely, the Monte Carlo method and the Wilks method based on order statistics. It is shown that the closed‐form expression can provide a reasonable approximation to results obtained by Monte Carlo sampling, without incurring the computational expense. The Wilks method is found to be a useful means of providing an upper bound for the percentiles of the uncertainty distribution while being computationally inexpensive compared with full Monte Carlo sampling. The lognormal approximation method and Wilks’s method appear attractive, practical alternatives for the evaluation of uncertainty in the output of fault trees and similar multilinear models.     

Analyzing multiple vector autoregressions through matrix-variate normal distribution with two covariance matrices

Abstract

This article proposes a new approach to analyze multiple vector autoregressive (VAR) models that render us a newly constructed matrix autoregressive (MtAR) model based on a matrix-variate normal distribution with two covariance matrices. The MtAR is a generalization of VAR models where the two covariance matrices allow the extension of MtAR to a structural MtAR analysis. The proposed MtAR can also incorporate different lag orders across VAR systems that provide more flexibility to the model. The estimation results from a simulation study and an empirical study on macroeconomic application show favorable performance of our proposed models and method.     

State work and the testing concours of citizenship

Anyone trying to be a citizen has to pass through a set of practices trying to be a state. This paper investigates some of the ways testing practices calibrate citizens, and in doing so, perform “the state.” The paper focuses on three forms of citizenship testing, which it considers exemplary forms of “state work,” and which all, in various ways, concern “migration.” First, the constitution of a “border crossing,” which requires an identity test configured by deceptibility. Second, the Dutch asylum process, in which “being gay” can, in certain cases, be reason for being granted asylum, but where “being gay” is also the outcome of an examination organized by suspicion. And third, the Dutch measurement of immigrants’ “integration,” which is comprised of a testing process in which such factishes as “being a member of society” and “being modern” surface. Citizenship is analyzed in this paper as accrued and (re)configured along a migration trajectory that takes shape as a testing concours, meaning that subjects become citizens along a trajectory of testing practices. In contributing both to work on states and citizenship, and to work on testing, this paper thus puts forward the concept of citizenship testing as state work, where “state work is the term for that kind of labor that most knows itself as comparison, equivalency, and exchange in the social realm” (Harney, 2002, pp. 10–11). Throughout the testing practices discussed here, comparison, equivalency, and exchange figure prominently as the practical achievements of crafting states and citizens.     

Subjective utility with upper and lower probabilities on finite states

This article is concerned with thresholds of discrimination of preference judgments under uncertainty. We establish an axiomatic characterization for a threshold representation, where thresholds are represented by inexact measurement of subjective probabilities, i.e., upper and lower probabilities. Since upper and lower probabilities need not be additive, the representational form adopts the Choquet integration.     

虚拟空间交织的取向原则

虚拟空间交织是人们常用的思维与认知方式之一。本文通过对交织及其原则的介绍,描述了虚拟空间交织的运作,指出虚拟空间交织构建中主观取向的原则应为最佳关联。     

供应链与海尔的战略调整

供应链是现代工商业的一种新的业态形式 ,它通过有效的客户和市场管理、对客户需求的准确预测和迅速反应以及最大程度地降低从原材料到生产、再到销售整个过程的库存和运转费用 ,为终端顾客提供最大的让渡价值 ,提高供应链成员整体的竞争力。海尔集团以超前性的战略眼光对公司的组织管理结构和经营方式进行了战略性的调整 ,为推行供应链管理和经营创造了条件。     

人力资源管理理论整体性缺陷与对策

当前人力资源管理理论缺陷引起多方面的重视 ,这些缺陷可以归结为理论的整体性缺陷。对人力资源管理的定义、历史和研究方法的分析表明 ,人力资源管理概念上的不完整和冲突 ,研究对象、范围和方法的不全面 ,以及核心原理的缺失是造成人力资源管理理论整体性缺陷的根源 ,由此能够找到克服整体性缺陷的对策     

论资本市场全球一体化趋势

资本市场全球一体化是当前全球资本市场发展的基本趋势。是指相对独立的全球各主要资本市场日益融合形成的统一市场网络组织结构体系。表现为市场组织形式的全球网络化 ;筹资主体的国际化 ;投资者的机构化及投资活动的国际化 ;资本流动的全球化 ;同质的金融资产价格趋同化 ;金融机构经营业务的混业化和全球化。资本市场全球一体化降低了市场主体的交易成本 ,提高了市场效率 ;为一些国家调节国际收支失衡与国际储备的保值增值提供了便利条件 ;有利于长期资本的优化配置 ,促进世界经济增长。同时也使各国运用货币政策调控宏观经济的有效性降低 ;市场的系统性风险增大 ;金融监管面临新的挑战     

科学心理学研究方法论的比较与整合

科学心理学形成以来 ,西方主要流派的研究方法论在心理科学的发展中有其贡献和局限。通过客观、发展的观点对心理学研究方法论的演化过程进行比较和分析 ,发现建构一个全面的、系统的、综合的心理学研究方法论是极其必要的 ,而且更具有现实可能性