Preface1Difference Equations12Lag Operators253Stationary ARMA Processes434Forecasting725Maximum Likelihood Estimation1176Spectral Analysis1527Asymptotic Distribution Theory1808Linear Regression Models2009Linear Systems of Simultaneous Equations23310Covariance-Stationary Vector Processes25711Vector Autoregressions29112Bayesian Analysis35113The Kalman Filter37214Generalized Method of Moments40915Models of Nonstationary Time Series43516Processes with Deterministic Time Trends45417Univariate Processes with Unit Roots47518Unit Roots in Multivariate Time Series54419Cointegration57120Full-Information Maximum Likelihood Analysis of Cointegrated Systems63021Time Series Models of Heteroskedasticity65722Modeling Time Series with Changes in Regime677A Mathematical Review704B Statistical Tables751C Answers to Selected Exercises769D Greek Letters and Mathematical Symbols Used in the Text786Author Index789Subject Index792

https://sisis.rz.htw-berlin.de/inh2007/12357004.pdf

Time series analysis

Consensus methods such as the Delphi survey technique are being employed to help enhance effective decision-making in health and social care. The Delphi survey is a group facilitation technique, which is an iterative multistage process, designed to transform opinion into group consensus. It is a flexible approach, that is used commonly within the health and social sciences, yet little guidance exists to help researchers undertake this method of data collection. This paper aims to provide an understanding of the preparation, action steps and difficulties that are inherent within the Delphi. Used systematically and rigorously, the Delphi can contribute significantly to broadening knowledge within the nursing profession. However, careful thought must be given before using the method; there are key issues surrounding problem identification, researcher skills and data presentation that must be addressed. The paper does not claim to be definitive; it purports to act as a guide for those researchers who wish to exploit the Delphi methodology.

Research guidelines for the Delphi survey technique.

The Delphi technique is a widely used and accepted method for gathering data from respondents within their domain of expertise. The technique is designed as a group communication process which aims to achieve a convergence of opinion on a specific real-world issue. The Delphi process has been used in various fields of study such as program planning, needs assessment, policy determination, and resource utilization to develop a full range of alternatives, explore or expose underlying assumptions, as well as correlate judgments on a topic spanning a wide range of disciplines. The Delphi technique is well suited as a method for consensus-building by using a series of questionnaires delivered using multiple iterations to collect data from a panel of selected subjects. Subject selection, time frames for conducting and completing a study, the possibility of low response rates, and unintentionally guiding feedback from the respondent group are areas which should be considered when designing and implementing a Delphi study.

/pdf/the-delphi-technique-making-sense-of-consensus-3xra3m43kw.pdf

The Delphi Technique: Making Sense of Consensus

Originally published in Contemporary Psychology: APA Review of Books, 1994, Vol 39(2), 225. Reviews the book, The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion by John Zaller (1992). The author's commendable effort to specify a model of mass opinion formation offers readers an introduction to the prevailing vi

The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion.

It comes as something ofa surprise to reflect that the New York Review ofBooks is now over twenty years old. Even people of my generation (that is, old enough to remember the revolutionary 196os but not young enough to have taken a very exciting part in them) think of the paper as eternally youthful. In fact, it has gone through years of relatively quiet life, yet, as always in a competitive journalistic market, it is the controversies that attract the interest of the reader and to which the history (especially an admittedly impressionistic survey that tries to include something of the intellectual context in which a journal has operated) must give some attention. Not all the attacks which the New York Review has attracted, both early in its career and more recently, are worth more than a brief summary. What do we now make, for example, of Richard Kostelanetz's forthright accusation that 'The New York Review was from its origins destined to publicize Random House's (and especially [Jason] Epstein's) books and writers'?1 Well, simply that, even if the statistics bear out the charge (and Kostelanetz provides some suggestive evidence to support it, at least with respect to some early issues), there is nothing surprising in a market economy about a publisher trying to push his books through the pages of a journal edited by his friends. True, the New York Review has not had room to review more than around fifteen books in each issue and there could be a bias in the selection of

http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/3507774.pdf

The New York Review of Books

This paper tests the proposition that an electorate disproportionately representative of higherclass citizens will be rewarded with public policies in favor of its economic interests and at the expense of the interests of lower-class citizens. We find a consistent negative relationship between the degree of class bias favoring the upper class and the generosity of indigenous state social welfare spending. We also find that it is the underrepresentation of the poor, rather than the overrepresentation of the wealthy, that principally explains this relationship. These findings have important implications for democratic theory generally and for present-day concern about the composition of the U.S. electorate.

The Policy Consequences of Class Bias in State Electorates

The methodological worth of the Delphi forecasting technique

Theory: Political participation by lower class voters should create pressures for government to respond with supportive policies. Hypotheses: Lower class voting is associated with more generous state welfare policies. Political forces and institutions structure this relationship. Methods: A pooled time series analysis for the 50 U.S. states from 1978 to 1990. Results: We demonstrate an enduring relationship between the degree of mobilization of lower-class voters and the generosity of welfare benefits provided by state governments. This relationship can be vitiated by remarkable political and economic events such as the "new federalism" and the economic recession in the early 1980s. Finally, the importance of lower-class mobilization for redistributive policy is enhanced by the liberalism and competitiveness of state Democratic parties.

http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/2111758.pdf

Lower-Class Mobilization and Policy Linkage in the U.S. States

Recent research on representational linkages between legislators and their constituents challenges the long-standing assumption that constituency preferences are exogenous to the linkage process but does not clearly suggest the conditions under which a specific pattern of linkage should exist. Drawing on a diverse collection of prior research the authors argue that issues that function as main lines of cleavage between competing political parties should be characterized by reciprocal linkages between mass and elite preferences while highly complex issues on which party distinctions are unclear should be characterized by no linkages between mass and elite. For salient issues on which the public fails to distinguish party positions the authors expect the traditional one-way linkage from mass to elite. The authors test their theoretical expectations with a unique version of the data from the 1958 American Representation Study--and with explicit predictions for which policy issues addressed in that study should demonstrate which particular pattern of mass-elite linkage. The empirical results derived from LISREL analyses for three policy areas are entirely in accord with the authors predictions. (authors)

Dyadic representation reappraised.

Research on various forms of mass-elite representational linkage and on public-president links specifically suggests that a reciprocal influence process exists between the attention to policy issues of the mass public and the president. Other research suggests that issue attention for both the president and the public is shaped by real-world cues. Time-series regression analyses of data from State of the Union addresses, Gallup polls, and for various indicators of policy-specific, real-world phenomena are employed to test these propositions and to extend prior research that has assumed presidents influence the public, but not vice versa. For foreign policy and economic policy there is a reciprocal influence process between the president and the mass public. For civil rights policy there is a one-way influence process from presidential to mass attention to the issue. The issue attention of the mass public, but not that of the president, is consistently influenced by realworld cues relevant to the particular policy area.

Kim Quaile Hill

Papers

The Policy Consequences of Class Bias in State Electorates

The methodological worth of the Delphi forecasting technique

Lower-Class Mobilization and Policy Linkage in the U.S. States

Dyadic representation reappraised.

The Policy Agendas of the President and the Mass Public: A Research Validation and Extension