bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Parents, teachers and able readers in Key Stage 1: conversations with parents
Authors: Stainthorp Rhona , Hughes Diana
Published: March 2003

This paper is a report of a series of semi‐structured interviews conducted with the parents of fifteen “precocious” readers during their child’s time in Key Stage 1. The parents were interviewed three times: once each academic year. The views expressed are those of the parents. There are important lessons to be learned from these parents. However, it has to be recognised that, as the parents of children with a precocious skill, their experiences may be atypical.
Understanding Organisational Features of Texts: A Realistic Expectation at Key Stage Two?
Authors: Green Sylvia
Published: March 2003

This article explores the expectations of the National Literacy Framework (NLSF) and highlights some problem areas in the context of the National Curriculum (NC) for English. One such area relates to the assessment criteria which were selected from the framework to address children’s understanding of organisational features of texts in reading and writing. The aim of the CamPAS English Project (Cambridge Primary Assessment Scheme) was to develop materials to support teacher assessment at key stage 2, focusing on the text level strand of the National Literacy Framework. Assessment units were developed which were linked to criteria selected from the framework. The materials were trialled with key stage 2 children and the data analysis provided evidence about the factors which affected their performance in reading and writing in the context of the NLSF text level criteria. Analyses of pupil performance and the documentation of the NC and the NLSF suggested that there were problems in this curriculum area.
Showing and telling: The Difference that makes a Difference
Authors: Lewis David
Published: March 2003

In this article I attempt to clarify an essential difference between the ways in which pictures and words convey meaning. Despite the fact that the distinction between showing and telling is widely understood and clearly marked in ordinary language, it is often ignored when writers and researchers provide accounts of how children’s picturebooks work. As a result, such accounts are often unrealistic, providing distorted images of picturebook text. I briefly examine one such attempt to differentiate and characterise various types of picturebook and then conclude by showing how Anthony Browne exploits the distinction between showing and telling to create the atmosphere of uncertainty and mystery in his classic book Gorilla.
Texts as Artefacts Crossing Sites: Map Making at Home and School
Authors: Pahl Kate
Published: March 2003

This article compares a child’s drawings at home with a child’s drawings at school. The drawings were of maps, which had been a school topic. As part of a longitudinal study looking at children’s text making at home and at school three particular homes were focused on for eighteen months. This article looks at one home – that of a six year old Turkish boy who lives with his mother and brother. The case study illustrates how children can take something learned at school and transform it at home. The article starts with discussing the text created in the home, then compares this to texts created at school. The point is made that children can activate meaning in a different way at home than at school. While this is one case study, it suggests that transforming artefacts across sites may be something children do that often goes undocumented.
“The True Story of Insy Winsy by A. Spider”
Authors: Evans Janet
Published: March 2003

This paper investigates how the writing of some Year 6 children was influenced by exposure to the work of a contemporary author of children’s literature and through reading a variety of fairy stories, traditional tales, fables and nursery rhymes. Their growing awareness of the way in which story structures are constructed in particular genres resulted in some thought–provoking short stories which exhibited intertextual references linked to life experiences and to parts of other texts they had read.
Tools for talking: the purposeful and inventive use of languages by bilingual children in primary classrooms
Authors: Murshad Abdul–Hayee
Published: March 2003

This article is based on a number of observations of bilingual children in an East London primary school, and some work carried out for a doctoral study. The article explores children’s views and perspectives on their use of first and second languages at home and at school. The kernel of the investigation is that language use is dependent on purpose. Bilingual children’s use of their first and second language depends on which language best serves a particular function. Often children who speak two or more languages on a regular basis combine these to create a new language. Schools therefore need to review their language policies and practices in relation to their pupil intake, taking into account the contribution of bilingual experience to children’s overall linguistic development. Teachers also need to understand parents’ views on their children’s language and literacy education. These issues are of vital importance if schools are to provide an inclusive curriculum.
Collaboration in a culturally responsive literacy pedagogy: educating teachers and Latino children
Authors: Stuart Denise , Volk Dinah
Published: March 2003

This article is an analysis of collaboration in a community center’s summer literacy tutoring program for 6–8 year old children, the majority of whom were Puerto Rican, Spanish–English bilinguals. The goal of the program was to increase the children’s motivation to read through engaging literacy activities with high quality, culturally relevant children’s literature. Reflecting a sociocultural perspective, the activities built on the children’s experiences at home with literacy as a collaborative practice. The program as a whole provided for multiple levels of collaboration among the participating adults and between the children and tutors, university students in a teacher preparation program. The focus of the article is on the ways the tutors collaborated and the benefits and challenges of that process. Implications for teacher education are shared, emphasizing the need for explicitly including collaboration as one important element of a literacy pedagogy for teachers of linguistically and culturally diverse children.
South–North Refugee Migration: Lessons for Development Cooperation
Authors: Rotte Ralph , Vogler Michael , Zimmermann Klaus F.
Published: March 2003

Migration has become a major concern of European development policies. By improving socio–economic and political conditions through development cooperation, a reduction of South–North migration flows is envisaged. This new approach is examined by analyzing the causes of asylum migration from developing countries to Germany. The econometric findings suggest that support of democracy, economic development and trade will not reduce migration, at least not in the medium‐run. However, restrictive legal measures work. Migration control by international development cooperation therefore seems to need a long–term perspective.
Specialization, Information, and Growth: A Sequential Equilibrium Analysis
Authors: Ng Yew‐Kwang , Yang Xiaokai
Published: March 2003

Pricing costs and information problems are introduced into a framework with consumer‐producers, economies of specialization, and transaction costs, to predict the endogenous and concurrent evolution of the division of labor and of information concerning economic organization acquired by society. Concurrent evolution generates endogenous growth based on the tradeoff between gains from information about the efficient pattern of the division of labor—which can be acquired via experiments with various patterns—and experimentation costs, which relate to the costs of discovering prices. The concept of Walras sequential equilibrium is developed to analyze the social learning process which is characterized by uncertainties in the direction of the evolution and by a certain trend of the evolutionary process.
Information, Evolution of the Institution of the Firm, and the Optimal Decision Horizon
Authors: Zhao Yimin
Published: March 2003

This paper introduces an information problem into Yang and Ng’s model of the firm, to study the process of social searching for the efficient structure of residual rights. The analysis adopts the concept of Walrasian sequential equilibrium developed in the literature of endogenous specialization to model this searching process. The main finding is that more organizational patterns will be experimented with, and therefore an efficient organizational pattern is more likely to be achieved as the pricing efficiency increases. The problem of determining the optimal decision horizon is solved by specifying a tradeoff between the benefits and calculation costs from longer decision horizons.
The Financing of Foreign Aid and Welfare: Income Versus Consumption Tax
Authors: Hatzipanayotou Panos , Michael Michael S.
Published: March 2003

Empirical evidence shows that developed countries use income or consumption taxes to generate tax revenue, of which they transfer a certain fraction as aid to less developed countries. This paper constructs a two‐country general equilibrium trade model that takes into account these realities, and examines the terms of trade, employment and welfare effects of international transfers when the donor country increases the fraction of its income or consumption tax revenue transferred as aid. The desirability of each method of aid financing is discussed from the viewpoint of national and world welfare, and conditions are identified under which aid improves world welfare with the one method of financing, and may worsen it with the other.
Productivity Growth and its Components in Chinese Agriculture after Reforms
Authors: Wu Shunxiang , Walker David , Devadoss Stephen , Lu Yao‐chi
Published: March 2003

This study uses nonparametric Malmquist procedures to investigate the temporal and spatial nature of productivity growth and its components in Chinese agriculture over the period 1980–1995. The results of this study indicate that total factor productivity grew at 2.4% annually with technical change augmenting the growth by 3.8% while efficiency change reduced productivity growth by 1.3%. For all provinces, 288 out of a total of 442 cases experienced productivity growth while the rest showed productivity regression during this post‐reform period. Coexistence of improvement in technical change and retardation in efficiency change indicates the lack of success in diffusing the existing agricultural technology. Continuing innovation and efficiency improvement through capital investment, modern input use, and greater competitive market pressures are important for augmenting productivity growth in Chinese agriculture.
Household Participation in Formal and Informal Savings Mechanisms: Evidence from Pakistan
Authors: Carpenter Seth B. , Jensen Robert T.
Published: March 2003

Savings are an important determinant of both individual and national wellbeing. Typically, households employ a wide range of mechanisms for saving, including both formal and informal institutions. The choice of savings instrument has important micro‐ and macroeconomic implications. However, little is known empirically about the patterns of use of these instruments, or the factors affecting household decisions/ abilities to use them. The authors apply household‐level data from a nationally representative survey for Pakistan to explore these issues in detail. In particular, they focus on the choice between banks and bisi, an informal saving committee similar in nature to a rotating‐savings‐and‐credit association.
Building Trade Barriers and Knocking Them Down
Authors: Gould David M. , Woodbridge Graeme L.
Published: March 2003

This paper examines the dynamic behavior of trade protection and liberalization. Consistent with evidence on the development of trade policies, policy decisions are modeled as the outcome of a political contest between import‐competing interests and exporters. Uncertainty about the success of political contests yields a dynamic equilibrium in which tariffs gradually increase over time. Eventually, increasing tariffs reduce profits in the exporting sector to such a degree that exporters enter the political arena and lobby actively against protection. Depending on the market characteristics, a political contest may generate a liberalization or a move toward autarky.
Capital Taxation and External Accounts in a Small Growing Economy
Authors: Lin Shuanglin
Published: March 2003

The effects of capital taxation on external accounts depend on how government allocates the tax revenue. With government debt being endogenous, an increase in either the residential or territorial capital tax rate may decrease net foreign asset holdings. With intergenerational transfers being endogenous, an increase in either the residential or territorial capital tax rate may increase net foreign asset holdings. With government spending being endogenous, an increase in the residential capital tax rate may either deteriorate or have no effect on the external accounts.
Who Benefits from Voluntary Export Restraints?
Authors: Ishikawa Jota
Published: March 2003

Using a simple Cournot‐oligopoly model, the paper examines the effects of voluntary export restraints (VERs) on profits, market shares, consumers’ surplus, and domestic welfare when the domestic market is open to foreign direct investment (FDI) or exports from a third country. A VER may induce FDI from the VER‐restricted country or exports from the third country. Under certain circumstances, the domestic firm loses from a VER. Even if the domestic firm gains, the increase in the market share of the domestic country induced by the VER could be less than that of the third country.
Politics, Structure of Protection, and Welfare
Authors: Stephen Chiu Y.
Published: March 2003

Three issues in the political economy of protection are examined. The first, the endogenization of interest group formation, is addressed from the perspective of profitability instead of the difficulty caused by the free‐rider problem. The second issue is the determinants of an interest group’s political influence. Two sets of determinants—the characteristics of the interest group and the political economic environment faced by that group—are identified. The third is the circumstances under which the presence of more interest groups is socially preferable to fewer. Such circumstances are related to the parameters of the model.
Sustainability in Closed and Open Economies
Authors: Klepper Gernot , Stähler Frank
Published: March 2003

This paper discusses unilateral sustainability policies for tradable resources in closed and open economies. The effects of sustainability policies are modeled in an intertemporal, competitive framework by applying different sustainability rules which are introduced unilaterally in the domestic country. The paper shows that no sustainability rule will lead to a slower rate of extraction of the resource. Unilateral policies will lead to an “import of sustainability.” It is also shown that the foreign country may well gain in terms of consumption and real income from such unilateral sustainability policies but not in terms of sustainability.
Risk Aversion, Wealth and International Capital Flows
Authors: Clark Ephraim , Jokung Octave
Published: March 2003

This paper models capital flows in a rich–poor, two‐country, two‐asset, dual‐risk economy with decreasing absolute risk aversion. The first risk is asset‐specific. The second is political and dependent; i.e., related to particular asset outcomes. In this framework, the role of wealth in determining asset preferences is demonstrated, and the conditions for diversification are derived. The wealth effect and diversification conditions are applied to explain ongoing two‐way capital flows in general as well as the apparent paradox of domestic capital flight with simultaneous inflows of foreign capital.
Environmental Policy and Industrial Competitiveness: The Pollution‐Haven Hypothesis Reconsidered
Authors: Bommer Rolf
Published: March 2003

The pollution‐haven hypothesis suggests that strict environmental standards reduce domestic producers’ competitiveness and result in relocation to countries with more lenient standards. This paper examines the question of whether relocation is always caused by reduced competitiveness at home. By using a signaling approach, it is shown that relocation can be undertaken for purely strategic reasons. Relocation is the producer’s tool of indirect rent‐seeking to convince the policymaker to refrain from a further tightening of environmental control. It is also shown that trade liberalization increases the probability of strategic relocation.
Tariffs as Signals of Uncompetitiveness
Authors: Collie David R. , Hviid Morten
Published: March 2003

In this paper, a domestic and a foreign firm compete as Cournot duopolists in the domestic market. The foreign firm has incomplete information about the costs of the domestic firm, but the domestic government and the domestic firm are completely informed. It is shown that the domestic government can use its tariff to signal about the costs of the domestic firm. In the separating equilibrium, the domestic government signals the uncompetitiveness of the domestic firm by setting a lower tariff than is optimal under complete information.
Profit‐Sharing and International Capital Mobility in Developing Countries
Authors: Chao Chi‐Chur , Yu Eden S. H.
Published: March 2003

This paper uses a general equilibrium model incorporating rural–urban migration to analyze and contrast the short‐ and long‐run effects of profit‐sharing. Specifically examined are the effects of profit‐sharing on rural–urban migration, the degree of competition among urban firms, and international mobility of capital. It is found that although profit‐sharing may raise urban employment in the short run, the scheme reduces urban employment and lowers the inflow of foreign capital in the long run.
Import Competition and Worker Productivity in Unionized Firms
Authors: Campbell Neil , Vousden Neil
Published: March 2003

This paper analyzes the effects of trade and labor market liberalization on wages and worker productivity/effort in a domestic unionized firm with firm‐union bargaining over wages and effort. It is shown that both types of liberalization will induce a ‘cold shower effect’ (a rise in effort) if the union’s objective function is more heavily weighted towards employment. However, the welfare effects of the two policies can differ markedly. The paper also identifies a separate productivity cost of protection associated with the distortionary effect of protection on worker effort.
International Trade and Commercial Policy for Durable Goods
Authors: Goering Gregory E. , Pippenger Michael K.
Published: March 2003

Many commodities traded internationally are durable in nature. A dynamic durable goods oligopoly trade model is analyzed. The analysis indicates that the pattern of intraindustry trade depends fundamentally on the quality or durability of the firms’ output. Indeed, product durability influences the effectiveness of commercial policy. For example, as domestic product durability rises, an increase in domestic tariffs has a smaller impact on domestic production. In addition, the model uncovers a previously unrecognized avenue by which product quality standards act as a barrier to trade. The results may help explain some of the empirical anomalies found in the literature.
Dynamics of Intraindustry Trade and Labor‐Market Adjustment
Authors: Brülhart Marius
Published: March 2003

This paper investigates some dynamic aspects of the ‘smooth adjustment hypothesis’ that is commonly associated with intraindustry trade (IIT). The analysis is conducted on a panel of plant‐level employment data and industry‐level production and trade data for Ireland. Rates of intraindustry job turnover are used as a proxy for labor‐market adjustment. Three findings stand out. First, a measure of marginal IIT is found to be more appropriate for the analysis of adjustment issues than the traditional static IIT index. Second, the effect of marginal IIT on labor‐market adjustment is most significant in the short term, namely for indices calculated on one‐year ntervals and lagged by one year. Third, the most significant determinants of the intraindustry job turnover rate are sector‐level plant concentration ratios and trade openness.
Trade in International Transport Services: The Role of Competition
Authors: Francois Joseph F. , Wooton Ian
Published: March 2003

The paper is concerned with trade in transport services (not cabotage but rather international shipping, transport, and related logistical services) and the importance of competition and market structure in the sector. It examines implications of liberalization for profits, trade, and national gains from trade. Though past GATS (General Agreement on Trade in Services) maritime negotiations involved the maritime nations, this paper also flags interests of consuming nations (particularly poorer developing countries). Issues raised in the analytical section are illustrated through a computational example, to provide a rough sense of orders of magnitude and the importance of the issues raised for basic gains from improved market access.
Optimal Pollution Standard in an Open Economy: Characterizing Environmental Diversity
Authors: Das Satya P.
Published: March 2003

The paper examines the optimal pollution standard for a large open economy. Using a two‐country partial‐equilibrium framework, the optimal standards are charaterized for autarky, free trade, and free trade together with cooperation among countries in setting standards. If pollution is local, at the free‐trade equilibrium, the exporting country imposes a stricter standard than does the importing country. The ranking may be reversed if pollution is transnational. A surpriising implication is that if pollution is local, cooperation may imply a less stringent standard for both the exporting country and the importing country.
EMU: Optimal Fiscal Strategy and the Punishment Effectiveness
Authors: Vranceanu Radu , Warin Thierry
Published: March 2003

This paper investigates the ability of the Stability and Growth Pact to prevent governments in the “euro zone” from running excessive budget deficits. It is shown that in a static two‐country game, the Pareto‐optimal strategy of no excess deficits cannot be systematically enforced, whatever the toughness of the sanction under the Pact. However, in a multiperiod setting, the Pareto‐optimal configuration of no excess deficits would prevail even if no sanctions were applied to deviant governments. In this case, neither a heavily punitive SGP, nor a centralized budget appears to be helpful in the EMU context.
Uncovered Interest Parity Revisited
Authors: Alexius Annika
Published: March 2003

A standard empirical finding in international finance is that countries with high nominal interest rates experience appreciations of their currencies, in contrast to predictions based on uncovered interest parity (UIP). However, tests of UIP have almost exclusively relied on data on short‐term interest rates. In this paper, UIP is tested on long‐term government bond yields. Since the presence of coupon payments induces a measurement error between the observed data and true returns, several different proxies for the latter are constructed. Furthermore, instrumental variable techniques are used. In contrast to thetypical finding, the results are rather favorable to UIP.
Poverty and Political Risk
Authors: Harms Philipp
Published: March 2003

The paper explains the negative correlation between developing countries’ per capita incomes and measures of political risk by relating a government’s decision to tax foreign investors to distributional interests in the host country’s population. Using a dynamic general‐equilibrium model in which agents make irreversible investments abroad to insure against country‐specific technology shocks, it is shown that the political risk for foreign investors is prohibitive if the host country’s initial per capita income is too low and if the benefits of international diversification are not high enough to generate a sufficiently strong opposition against discriminatory taxation.
Monetary Union and the Transaction Cost Savings of a Single Currency
Authors: Mendizábal Hugo Rodríguez
Published: March 2003

This paper computes the transaction cost savings derived from the European Monetary Union. A continuoustime, stochastic, Baumol‐like model is generalized to include several currencies and calibrated to fit European data. The analysis implies an upper bound for the savings derived from reductions in transaction costs of approximately 0.69% of Union GDP. Additionally, the magnitudes of the brokerage fee and the volatility of transactions, whose estimation has traditionally been difficult to address empirically, are approximated for Europe.
Rent Capitalization and Transportation Infrastructure Development in Jakarta
Authors: Cervero Robert , Susantono Bambang
Published: March 2003

Using Jakarta, Indonesia as a case study, we evaluate the degree to which proximity to freeway interchanges gets capitalized into office rents, controlling for factors like regional accessibility. The research shows strong capitalization effects, with rent premiums decaying exponentially with distances from freeway access points. It also shows that office rents are a stronger function of distance to Jakarta’s historical center, Monas, than a gravity‐based measure of accessibility to upper‐income households. Thus, a monocentric measure of location explained variation in office rents better than a polycentric measure of proximity to labor markets. While value capture principles are attractive in theory, implementation is particularly difficult in developing countries like Indonesia. Jakarta’s own betterment tax program has been plagued by poor administration and enforcement. We argue that shifting betterment tax financing away from a focus on residential properties to high‐end office and commercial land uses would likely yield higher rates of return and be far easier to implement.
Teachers, Texts, and Scribes
Authors: Royalty, Jr Robert M.
Published: March 2003

Books reviewed in this article:

Snyder, H. Gregory, Teachers and Texts in the Ancient World: Philosophers, Jews Christians

Haines‐Eitzen, Kim, Guardians of Letters: Literacy, Power, and the Transmitters of Early Christian Literature
Theologia Incurvata In Se Ipse?: One Feminist Theologian’s Reading of Eberhard Jüngel’s Theology
Authors: Watson Natalie K.
Published: March 2003

Books reviewed in this article:

Eberhard Jüngel, Justification: The Heart of the Christian Faith

Eberhard Jüngel, God’s Being is in Becoming: The Trinitarian Being of God in the Theology of Karl Barth. A Paraphrase
The Bible, the Empire and the Other
Authors: Althaus–Reid Marcella
Published: March 2003

Book reviewed in this article:

R. S. Sugirtharajah, The Bible in the Third World: Precolonial, Colonial and Postcolonial Encounters
Ideology or People?
Authors: Ozinga James R.
Published: March 2003

Book reviewed in this article:

Mikhail Gorbachev and Zdenek Mlynár, Conversations with Gorbachev on Perestroika, the Prague Spring, and the Crossroads of Socialism
Fiscal Institutions and Wage Bargaining in the Local Public Sector
Authors: Strøm Bjarne
Published: March 2003

In a theoretical analysis of the properties of different wage setting and financing systems in the local public sector, two financing systems are considered. A benchmark model with local financing through local taxes is compared with a system of centralized financing through grants, where taxes are decided at the national level. It is shown that the wage outcomes under centralized financing depend heavily on the order of moves in the budgetary game between the central and local levels.

JEL Classification: H23; J45
Temporary Migration, Human Capital, and Language Fluency of Migrants
Authors: Dustmann Christian
Published: March 2003

This paper investigates human capital investment of immigrants whose duration in the host country is limited, either by contract or by their own choice. The first part of the paper develops a model which distinguishes between temporary migrations where the return time is exogenous or optimally chosen. The analysis has a number of interesting implications for empirical work, some of which are explored in the second part of the paper. The analysis focuses on language capital and tests the hypothesis that country specific human capital investments are sensitive to the duration in the host country's labour market. The results show that the acquisition of language capital is sensitive to the intended duration in the host country.
Unskilled Migration: A Burden or a Boon for the Welfare State?
Authors: Razin Assaf , Sadka Efraim
Published: March 2003

As relatively low earners, migrants are net beneficiaries of the welfare state. Therefore, in a static setup, migration may be resisted by the entire native‐born population. However, it is shown that in a dynamic setup with a pension system, which is an important pillar of any welfare state, migration is beneficial to all income (high and low) and all age (old and young) groups, when the economy has good access to international capital markets. The pro‐migration feature of the dynamic model is weakened and possibly overturned when the economy does not have good access to such markets. In this case, to the extent that factor prices are significantly affected by migration because of low substitution between labour and capital, low‐skill native born and possibly also high‐skill native born may lose.
The Distributional Impact of Public Goods Provision: A Veil of Ignorance Approach
Authors: Thum Claudio , Weichenrieder Alfons J.
Published: March 2003

The “veil of ignorance” approach is used to consider the redistribution implied by different tax‐benefit systems. Assuming a (hypothetical) ex‐ante situation in which individuals lack any knowledge about their future income, redistribution from rich to poor can be seen as a form of insurance. Taking redistribution and insurance as synonymous, the analysis derives cases of redistributionally neutral systems of taxation and public good provision.

JEL classification: H23; D30;,H41
Life satisfaction and competence of Bosnian refugees in Norway
Authors: Van Selm Karin , Lackland Sam David , Van Oudenhoven Jan Pieter
Published: March 2003

In this study the relative influence of age, gender, locus of control, preferred acculturation strategy, perceived majority members’ attitude, and social support on life satisfaction and competence of Bosnian refugees was examined. Hundred and six Bosnians living temporarily in Norway completed a questionnaire. The results showed that persons with a higher internal locus of control had a higher life satisfaction and higher feelings of competence. The acculturation option assimilation was related to the highest life satisfaction, while the integration option was related to the highest feelings of competence. The more positive reactions the respondents received from Norwegians, the higher their life satisfaction and the higher their feelings of competence. Older refugees reported the highest feelings of competence.
Personality characteristics of women with alcohol addiction: A Rorschach study of women in an early treatment programme
Authors: Bergman Inger , Haver Brit , Bergman Hans , Dahlgren Lena , Nielsen Geir H.
Published: March 2003

This study identifies personality characteristics in a group of Swedish women (N=60) attending their first treatment for alcohol problems.The treatment programme specifically addressed women in an early phase of their drinking career, and was called "Early Treatment of Women with Alcohol Addiction" (EWA). Rorschach personality profiles of the 60 women differed significantly in almost all investigated aspects in a psychopathological direction from norms reported by Exner for a reference group of female non‐patients. The findings are consistent with the assumption that, although the EWA women were socially well‐functioning and fairly early in their drinking career, they nevertheless reveal serious underlying psychopathology. Clinical implications of the findings are discussed.
Sex differences in 1‐, 3‐, and 5‐year‐olds' toy‐choice in a structured play‐session
Authors: Servin Anna , Bohlin Gunilla , Berlin Lisa
Published: March 2003

This cross‐sectional study investigated toy‐choice in 38 one‐year‐old, 33 three‐year‐old, and 35 five‐year‐old children, who could choose between 10 different toys (four feminine, four masculine, and two neutral) in a structured play‐session. The children played alone for 7 minutes and together with their accompanying parent for another 7 minutes (play‐status). The results showed that girls and boys chose different toys from as early as the age of one year (Mdn=12 months). These sex differences were found at all three ages. In contradiction to earlier studies, our results showed that feminine toys became less interesting for both girls and boys with increasing age. The present study showed no consistent effects of play‐status. This study contributes to the knowledge of how early behavioral sex differences can be observed, how these differences develop, and it also raises questions concerning what sex differences stem from.
Rorschach interrater agreement estimates: An empirical evaluation
Authors: Grønnerød Cato
Published: March 2003

A standardized estimation of Rorschach interrater agreement is needed. Percentage agreement, although widely used, is found to be unsuitable. Forty‐one protocols from adults in both a normal and a psychiatric sample were scored by two or three scorers, making 85 scoring pairs. Percentage agreement, correlations (phi and Pearson’s r), and kappa were computed on single response, total score, and category level. Percentage agreement shows minimal variation. Even when exceeding 0.80, it can obscure major disagreements. Kappa and correlations both vary in a similar way with level of disagreement. Total score level does not give additional information compared to single score and category levels. Kappa proved to be conservative and reliable and is therefore suggested as a standard estimate.
A Swedish Translation of the 20‐item Toronto Alexithymia Scale: Cross‐validation of the Factor Structure
Authors: Simonsson‐Sarnecki Margareta , Lundh Lars‐Gunnar , Törestad Bertil , Bagby R. Michael , Taylor Graeme , Parker James
Published: March 2003

The purpose of this study was to develop a new Swedish translation of the twenty‐item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS‐20) and to examine if the theoretical structure that underlies the factor structure of the English version of the TAS‐20 could be recovered in this Swedish translation of the instrument. A sample of 157 undergraduate students of psychology was tested. Using confirmatory factor analysis, the previously established three‐factor TAS‐20 model was found to be replicable in this sample. In addition, the Swedish translation of the TAS‐20 showed adequate internal reliability. The present study also illustrates the importance of using back translation methodology when transposing psychometric instruments from one language to another.
Time‐series Analysis of the Relationship between Dizziness and Stress
Authors: Andersson Gerhard , Yardley Lucy
Published: March 2003

Ten individuals with dizziness participated in a longitudinal study on the relationship between stress and dizziness. The participants rated dizziness and stress on visual analogue scales twice daily for a period of 28 days (in all 56 data points). The ratings of stress included physical stress, mental stress, emotional stress, and the presence of stressful events. The data was analysed by means of time‐series analysis (ARIMA), and the temporal associations investigated by lagged correlations. Results showed concurrent associations between dizziness and mental and emotional stress. However, individual differences were observed indicating complex and diverse patterns of association between different forms of stress and dizziness.
Sex Differences in Strategy and Performance on Computerized Neuropsychological Tests as Related to Gender Identity and Age at Puberty
Authors: Wirsén Meurling Ann , Tonning‐Olsson Ingrid , Levander Sten
Published: March 2003

Neuropsychological sex differences have since long been under debate. Support for the relation between behavioral differences and biological variables like hormone influence is, however, emerging. Sixteen men and sixteen women, all university students, were tested with computerized neuropsychological tests (APT), the Bem Sexual Role Inventory, and asked about pubertal age. The results were in line with earlier findings of sex differences in neuropsychological tests, men being faster and women more cautious. The assumption that women tend to use left‐hemispheric, verbal/serial strategies also in spatial tasks was also partly supported. In women, late onset of puberty was related to better spatial performance, and there were also more intercorrelations between verbal and spatial tests in the female than in the male group, indicating that women use less specific strategies (more g‐factor intelligence) in problem solving, or that aptitudes are less compartmentalized in women than in men.
On the relationship between locus of control, level of ability and gender
Authors: Manger Terje , Eikeland Ole‐Johan
Published: March 2003

In a sample of Norwegian 14‐ and 15‐year‐old students no significant relationship was found between total externality‐internality score and level of ability. However, a significant relationship was found between ability and a subscale of locus of control related to degree of belief in the impact of school effort. The analyses of gender differences showed that girls had significantly higher total internal locus of control scores than boys. Boys were, however, significantly more internally oriented than girls on a subscale related to the respondents’ general belief in luck, while girls were significantly more internally oriented than boys on a school effort scale. The present study does not support the notion that girls develop an attributional pattern which is more closely related to their abilities while boys may develop a broader attributional pattern.
The hierarchical structure of empathy: Dimensional organization and relations to social functioning
Authors: Cliffordson Christina
Published: March 2003

The purpose of the present study was to examine the structure of empathy using a hierarchical approach, and to compare the dimensions of empathy with measures of social functioning, in order to contribute to the understanding of the nature of empathy. The dimensionality of the Interpersonal Reactivity Index, which comprises four subscales (empathic concern, perspective taking, fantasy and personal distress) was examined using confirmatory factor analysis. Relations with the Social Skills Inventory were also investigated. A sample of 127 applicants for places on nursing and social work undergraduate programs participated in the study. The study findings indicate that empathy is hierarchi‐cally organized, with one general dimension at the apex. The general factor is identical to empathic concern and this dimension overlaps to a great extent with perspective taking and fantasy. The findings also indicate that the general dimension constitutes an integrated entirety, with its main emphasis on emotional reactivity by also involving cognitive processes.
Extinction after partial reinforcement: Predicted vs. judged persistence
Authors: Svartdal Frode
Published: March 2003

The partial reinforcement extinction effect (PREE) (i.e., increased persistence following partial reward) is one of the most important generalizations from experimental studies of learning. Many theories of PREE assume that it involves cognitive and emotional mechanisms, but investigations of PREE have focused almost exclusively on behavioral measures. Four experiments with human adults investigated whether PREE is also reflected in cognitive measures. Independent groups of subjects learned an instrumental response under CRF vs. PRF contingencies, and then predicted (Experiments 1, 2, and 3) and/or judged (Experiments 3 and 4) their own persistence under extinction conditions. Predictions of persistence were unrelated to prior continuous or partial reinforcement contingencies (Experiments 1, 2, and 3), but subsequent judgments of persistence behavior were accurate (Experiments 3 and 4). These results indicate that increased persistence due to occasional reward is not well represented cognitively prior to its behavioral manifestation, but it is well represented after that manifestation. Possible explanations and implications of this apparent behavior–cognition dissociation are discussed.
Inference and Missing Data: Asymptotic Results
Authors: Nielsen Søren Feodor
Published: March 2003

In Rubin (1976) the missing at random (MAR) and missing completely at random (MCAR) conditions are discussed. It is concluded that the MAR condition allows one to ignore the missing data mechanism when doing likelihood or Bayesian inference but also that the stronger MCAR condition is in some sense the weakest generally sufficient condition allowing (conditional) frequentist inference while ignoring the missing data mechanism. In this paper it is shown that (a slightly strengthened version of) the MAR condition is sufficient to yield ordinary large sample results for estimators and test statistics and thus may be used for (asymptotic) frequentist inference.
The Additive Genetic Gamma Frailty Model
Authors: Korsgaard Inge Riis , Andersen Anders Holst
Published: March 2003

In this paper the additive genetic gamma frailty model is defined. Individual frailties are correlated as a result of an additive genetic model. An algorithm to construct additive genetic gamma frailties for any pedigree is given so that the variance–covariance structure among individual frailties equals the numerator relationship matrix times a variance. The EM algorithm can be used to estimate the parameters in the model. Calculations are similar using the EM algorithm in the shared frailty model, however the E step is not correspondingly simple. This is illustrated re‐analysing data, analysed by the shared frailty model in Nielsen et al. (1992), from the Danish adoptive register. Goodness of fit of the additive genetic gamma frailty model can be tested after analysing data with the correlated frailty model. Doing so, a “defect” in the often used and otherwise well behaving likelihood was found
Estimating the Population Survival Function Using Additional Information Recorded Over Time: a Filter Based Approach
Authors: Martinussen Torben , Scheike Thomas H.
Published: March 2003

Survival studies often collect information about covariates. If these covariates are believed to contain information about the life‐times, they may be considered when estimating the underlying life‐time distribution. We propose a non‐parametric estimator which uses the recorded information about the covariates. Various forms of incomplete data, e.g. right‐censored data, are allowed. The estimator is the conditional mean of the true empirical survival function given the observed history, and it is derived using a general filtering formula. Feng & Kurtz (1994) showed that the estimator is the Kaplan–Meier estimator in the case of right‐censoring when using the observed life‐times and censoring‐times as the observed history. We take the same approach as Feng & Kurtz (1994) but in addition we incorporate the recorded information about the covariates in the observed history. Two models are considered and in both cases the Kaplan–Meier estimator is a special case of the estimator. In a simulation study the estimator is compared with the Kaplan–Meier estimator in small samples.
Semiparametric Additive Accelerated Life Models
Authors: Bordes Laurent
Published: March 2003

In this paper we investigate the asymptotic properties of estimators obtained for the semiparametric additive accelerated life model proposed by Bagdonavicius & Nikulin (1995). This model generalizes the well known additive hazards model of survival analysis and is close to the general transformation model (see Dabrowska & Doksum, 1988). Asymptotic properties of the estimator of the regression parameter and the estimator of the reliability function are given in the case of right censoring for discretized data and a numerical example illustrates these results.
Approximate Representation of Estimators in Constrained Regression Problems
Authors: Wang Jinde
Published: March 2003

The estimators of inequality‐constrained regression problems can be computed by iterative algorithms of mathematical programming, but they do not have analytical expressions in terms of the given data. This situation brings obstacles to further studies on the constrained regression. In this paper we derive approximate representations of the estimators with a remainder of magnitude (N−1 log log N)1/2. From these representations one can clearly see the concrete structure of the estimators of these problems. It will be very helpful for further regression analysis.
An Estimation Method of the Pair Potential Function for Gibbs Point Processes on Spheres
Authors: Billiot Jean‐Michel , Goulard Michel
Published: March 2003

An estimation method for pairwise interaction potential of a stationary Gibbs point process is introduced by considering the case of observations located on a sphere. It is based both on Fourier decomposition of the potential and on minimum contrast estimation. It is defined when many independent realizations of the process are available. Consistency and asymptotic normality are proved for the resulting estimators. The method enables derivation of the choice of the potential function by embedded hypotheses testing. The method is applied to independent observations of root locations on internodes around stem of maize roots. The internodes are described as circles and we focus on the interaction function associated with the potential. Since a model with too many components seems to fail, we choose a sequential procedure based on embedded hypotheses testing to build a simpler model.
A Stochastic Geometry Model for Functional Magnetic Resonance Images
Authors: HARTVIG NIELS VÆVER
Published: March 2003

In functional magnetic resonance imaging, spatial activation patterns are commonly estimated using a non‐parametric smoothing approach. Significant peaks or clusters in the smoothed image are subsequently identified by testing the null hypothesis of lack of activation in every volume element of the scans. A weakness of this approach is the lack of a model for the activation pattern; this makes it difficult to determine the variance of estimates, to test specific neuroscientific hypotheses or to incorporate prior information about the brain area under study in the analysis. These issues may be addressed by formulating explicit spatial models for the activation and using simulation methods for inference. We present one such approach, based on a marked point process prior. Informally, one may think of the points as centres of activation, and the marks as parameters describing the shape and area of the surrounding cluster. We present an MCMC algorithm for making inference in the model and compare the approach with a traditional non‐parametric method, using both simulated and visual stimulation data. Finally we discuss extensions of the model and the inferential framework to account for non‐stationary responses and spatio‐temporal correlation.
On the Relation between Edge and Vertex Modelling in Shape Analysis
Authors: HOBOLTH ASGER , KENT JOHN T. , DRYDEN IAN L.
Published: March 2003

Objects in the plane with no obvious landmarks can be described by either vertex transformation vectors or edge transformation vectors. In this paper we provide the relation between the two transformation vectors.Grenander & Miller (1994) use a multivariate normal distribution with a block circulant covariance matrix to model the edge transformation vector. This type of model is also feasible for the vertex transformation vector and in certain cases the free parameters of the two models match up in a simple way. A vertex model and an edge model are applied to a data set of sand particles to explore shape variability.