Showing papers by "University of Memphis published in 1987"

The Sensitivity of Confirmatory Maximum Likelihood Factor Analysis to Violations of Measurement Scale and Distributional Assumptions

Abstract: A large-scale simulation design was used to study the sensitivity of maximum likelihood (ML) factor analysis to violations of measurement scale and distributional assumptions in the input data. Pro...

Development of the Connected Speech Test (CST).

Abstract: This paper describes the first phase in the development of the Connected Speech Test (CST). This test of intelligibility of everyday speech has been developed primarily for use as a criterion measure in investigations of hearing aid benefit. The test consists of 48 passages of conversationally produ

Family characteristics and long-term consequences associated with sexual abuse.

Abstract: As opposed to father—daughter incest, little attention has been paid to the long-term consequences and family dynamics associated with child sexual abuse of females perpetrated by extended family members or extrafamilial contacts. Female undergraduates (n = 586) completed questionnaires on family history, sexual experiences, and current functioning. Results confirmed other research suggesting that father—daughter incest is associated with a traditional patriarchal family structure. However, sexual abuse overall, regardless of perpetrator, was associated with certain uniform family characteristics. Moreover, sexual abuse had certain long-term consequences, regardless of perpetrator. These results suggest the importance of attention to family characteristics in all cases of child sexual abuse.

Limitations of Preschool Instruments and Standards for Minimal Levels of Technical Adequacy

Abstract: Serious evaluation of preschool instruments has been limited in part by the lack of standard technical adequacy criteria. This article suggests minimal levels of technical adequacy for subtest and total test internal consistency, stability, floors, subtest item gradients, and validity. Ten commonly used preschool instruments (5 used for placement purposes and 5 used for general skills testing) were evaluated according to the proposed criteria, and suggestions were made that concerned the use of the instruments. The principal recommendation made is that practitioners carefully select instruments for preschool assessment according to the instruments' technical adequacy.

An Empirical Study of Salesforce Turnover

Abstract: Employee turnover is a subject of great importance to practitioners and researchers alike. Though the research on employee turnover in general is extensive, a search of the literature uncovered few...

Social competence and parental support as mediators of the link between stress and metabolic control in adolescents with insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus.

Abstract: This study investigated whether the link between stress and metabolic control in adolescents with insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM) is direct or indirect and whether this association is mediated by either social competence or parental support. Subjects included 104 adolescents with IDDM and their mothers. Measures of adherence, life stress, social competence, and parental support were obtained during the assessment session, and metabolic control was determined by averaging the adolescent's glycosylated hemoglobin levels during the previous year. Multiple regression analysis revealed that stress was directly associated with metabolic control, independent of the link between adherence and metabolic control. Multiple regression analysis also showed that social competence buffered the negative association between stress and metabolic control. Moreover, parental support was directly linked with adherence, and adolescent age was indirectly linked with adherence through its association with parental support. These findings are consistent with the developmental transitions that accompany adolescence.

Suppression of earthquakes by large continental ice sheets

Abstract: The interior regions of Antarctica and Greenland are aseismic: no earthquake larger than body-wave magnitude 4.5–5.0 is known for either, except along coastal zones or continental shelves. Here I advance an explanation for this lack of seismic activity in terms of pressure effects produced by the continental ice sheets that mantle both continents.

Model of Associations Between Psychosocial Variables and Health-Outcome Measures of Adolescents with IDDM

Abstract: The purpose of this study was to develop a model that describes the contributions of key psychosocial variables to the health outcome of adolescents with insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (IDDM). Subjects were 93 adolescents with IDDM and their parents. Health-outcome measures included adherence and metabolic control (HbA 1c ). Psychosocial variables included adolescent age, chronic life stress, social competence, family relations, and family knowledge about IDDM. Multiple regression analyses showed that adherence ( P P P P P 1c and 18.5% of the variance in predicting adherence. In general, these findings are consistent with extant theory. The direct link between stress and metabolic control, however, contrasts with the current view that psychosocial variables affect metabolic control indirectly through their influence on adherence behavior. The methodological limitations of the findings are noted, directions for future research are suggested, and the implications for clinical interventions are described.

Describing Correctional-Security Dropouts and Rejects: An Individual or Organizational Profile?

Abstract: High turnover among correctional workers is a chronic problem in today's prisons. Despite the concern surrounding this issue, there is little empirical research that deals with the instability of prison staffs. This article attempts to identify the major predictors of correctional officer turnover in one minimum-medium security prison in the western United States. Multivariate discriminant analyses suggest that three factors are of primary importance in distinguishing continuing from terminating officers—race, opportunities to influence institutional policy decisions, and most important, satisfaction with perceived working conditions. The findings suggest that the development of individual personality profiles may lead correctional administrators to overlook the role of prison organizational environments in contributing to security staff turnover.

Exact confidence bounds for an exponential parameter under hybrid censoring

Abstract: Consider a life testing experiment in which n units are put on test, successive failure times are recorded, and the observation is terminated either at a specified number r of failures or a specified time T whichever is reached first. This mixture of type I and type II censoring schemes, called hybrid censoring, is of wide use. Under this censoring scheme and the assumption of an exponential life distribution, the distribution of the maximum likelihood estimator of the mean life θ is derived. It is then used to construct an exact lower confidence bound for θ.

Validation of the 24-hour dietary recall in preschool children.

Abstract: The results of the current study indicate that data obtained by the dietary recall correlate highly with the children's weighed food intake if a parent or the primary caretaker providing the child's food responds to the interview. Meredith et al. found parents to be poor reporters of children's consumption outside the home. It is encouraging to note that parents can be reliable reporters of their children's food intake in the home environment. When errors did occur, they were errors in portion size, as 96% of foods eaten by the children were correctly identified by the parents. Parents under-reported only 4% of the time. This slight tendency to under-report is consistent with other reports of the validity of the 24-hour dietary recall. In younger children, parents appear to be reliable reporters of their children's in-home dietary intake. As children become older, they appear to be able to recall their own intake both within and outside the home. There are several possible explanations for these findings. First, several factors could have influenced the accuracy of parental reports of the child's intake during the day that we weighed foods. Because food was weighed in the homes, the parents undoubtedly attended more closely to their child's diet. Additionally, the dietary recalls were collected at the end of the day of observation. This was closer in time than most 24-hour recalls and may have reflected less memory decay than usual. Also, since our sample was primarily middle-class families who were well educated, the correspondence between actual vs. reported dietary intake may have been artificially enhanced.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Interactions between fish and salamander larvae : Costs of predator avoidance or competition?

Abstract: Two species of salamander larvae (Ambystoma talpoideum and A. maculatum) were reared separately in the presence and absence of a fish (Lepomis macrochirus) in artificial ponds to measure the effects of a predator on the growth, survival, diet, and activity of larvae. The presence of L. macrochirus reduced body sizes of larvae by 18% in A. talpoideum and by 16% in A. maculatum. L. macrochirus apparently preyed on the smallest individuals. Survival in the presence of L. macrochirus decreased by 61% in A. talpoideum and by 97% in A. maculatum compared with larvae reared alone. Species identity did not significantly effect body size or survival, but an interaction effect suggested that A. maculatum was more severely affected by predators than was A. talpodeum. Activity of larvae in the water column was dramatically reduced in the presence of L. macrochirus, when larvae were restricted to the leaf litter of the benthic zone. There was overlap in the diets of fish and salamander larvae. Larvae reared in the presence of fish, however, consumed different taxa of prey as well as reduced number of prey compared to larvae reared alone. A. talpoideum larvae were more nocturnal than diurnal in the absence of fish, whereas A. maculatum larvae were equally active day and night. This experiment suggests that predator-prey relationships can change with shifts in species attributes and potentially confound apparent costs of predator avoidance with competition. Measuring the long-term dynamics of the cost-benefit relationship will help elucidate how prey balance the demands of their life history with the demands of predators.

The family relations of female juvenile delinquents

Abstract: This study evaluated the assumption that the family relations of female delinquents are more dysfunctional than those of male delinquents. In a 2 × 2 (gender by delinquency status) design, 32 intact families were matched on demographic variables, and the male and female delinquents were matched on arrest data. Mothers, fathers, and adolescents were administered a selfreport personality inventory and were observed during a family interaction task. Consistent with the extant literature, families of delinquents had low rates of facultative information exchange and delinquent adolescents were more dominant toward their mothers than were well-adjusted adolescents. It was also observed that fathers of delinquents were more dominant toward their wives than were fathers of well-adjusted adolescents. In regard to the primary purpose of the study, it was observed that mother-adolescent dyads and parents in families of female delinquents had higher rates of conflict than their counterparts in families of male delinquents. In addition, the fathers of female delinquents were more neurotic than the fathers of male delinquents. These findings provide some support for the view that the families of female deliquents are especially dysfunctional.

The assessment of children's physical activity: a comparison of methods.

Abstract: The authors assessed the convergent validity and the sources of error in an electronic single-plane accelerometer (i.e., Caltrac Personal Activity Computer (Hemokinetics, Inc., Vienna, VA). The device was validated against observed all-day physical activity levels of children in their natural environment. Thirty pre-school children were observed in non-structured activity for periods of approximately 9 h while wearing the accelerometer. The results revealed moderately high but variable Spearman rank-order correlations between hourly readings of the accelerometer and the observational system (range of correlations = 0.62 to 0.95). An all-day accelerometer reading significantly correlated with the observational instrument (rho = 0.54). A step-wise regression analysis revealed that the best behavioral predictor of the all-day accelerometer reading was the observed behavior of walking, explaining 32% of the total variance. Older vs younger children (i.e., greater than 32.5 months), females vs males, and overweight (i.e., 75 percentile or greater) vs normal weight children tended to show higher correlations between direct observation and accelerometer readings. Implications of these findings and the utilization of the accelerometer in epidemiologic research are discussed.

Patterns of Program Evaluation Practice Among Members of the Evaluation Research Society and Evaluation Network

Abstract: Using stratified random sampling of the membership directories of the Evaluation Network and the Evaluation Research Society, we surveyed the practices of program evaluators. Those practices factored into four patterns—academic evaluation, stakeholder service evaluation, decision-driven evaluation, and outcome evaluation. The patterns were differentially related to such factors as disciplinary background, organizational setting, and evaluation theory.

Self-help dieting strategies in college males and females

Abstract: The present study sought to determine the self-help dieting strategies used by college men and women. There were 204 adults (102 males, 102 females) asked (1) the degree of importance placed on achieving and maintaining their ideal weight, (2) the reasons (i. e., health, appearance, or psychological) for dieting, and (3) the specific types of food restriction and physical activity methods used. Results indicated that females were much more likely to have actively dieted during the past 6 months and were more likely to see a discrepancy between their real and ideal weight. Furthermore, females placed a much higher importance on the appearance benefits of maintaining an ideal weight. Females were much more likely to engage in physical activity strategies (both appropriate and inappropriate) primarily for weight reduction than males. Similarly, females were much more likely to engage in both dangerous and safe food restriction strategies than males. The results are discussed, and implications for future research are offered.

Religiosity and Institutional Deviance: The impact of Religious Variables upon Inmate Adjustment:

Abstract: A number of studies in recent years have examined the extent to which religious commitment is related to deviance. Generally, this literature indicates that religiosity is inversely related to vari...

Ramsey numbers for local colorings

Abstract: The concept of a localk-coloring of a graphG is introduced and the corresponding localk-Ramsey numberr loc k (G) is considered. A localk-coloring ofG is a coloring of its edges in such a way that the edges incident to any vertex ofG are colored with at mostk colors. The numberr loc k (G) is the minimumm for whichK m contains a monochromatic copy ofG for every localk-coloring ofK m . The numberr loc k (G) is a natural generalization of the usual Ramsey numberr k (G) defined for usualk-colorings. The results reflect the relationship betweenr k (G) andr loc k (G) for certain classes of graphs.

A Computer-Based Strategy for Personalizing Verbal Problems in Teaching Mathematics

Abstract: The purpose of this study was to evaluate a computer-based strategy for personalizing verbal problems used in mathematics instruction. Personalization was achieved through a computer program that incorporated names of familiar people and events, such as the student’s friends and birth date, into print copies of lesson examples. In two control treatments, concrete (nonadaptive) contexts and abstract contexts were employed. Subjects were 54 fifth- and sixthgraders studying a lesson on division of fractions. Results showed the personalized-context treatment to be advantageous relative to one or both control treatments for (a) solving conventional word problems, (b) solving transfer problems, (c) recognizing rule procedures, and (d) developing favorable attitudes toward materials. Theoretical interpretations of these effects are discussed, along with considerations about the practicality and effectiveness of the present application using print materials compared to an earlier one using CAl.

A Test of Weak‐Form Efficiency in Residential Real Estate Returns

Abstract: This paper tests weak-form efficiency of residential real estate returns for the city of Memphis, Tennessee. The database for the study is comprised of the population of all sales of single-unit residential property over a fifteen-year period, 1970–1984. The city was divided into ten submarkets based on Memphis City Planning Commission planning districts. An analysis of variance procedure was utilized to stabilize the variance both within and across submarkets and nonmarket financing was partially controlled by eliminating transactions with loan-to-value ratios greater than 95%. The remaining transactions were then used to generate a mean return series. The advantage of the mean over the single transaction series used by Gau is that it represents the most likely outcome for the investor trying to duplicate investment performance since “property unique” features would be expected to cancel. Seven of the ten submarkets exhibited time patterns; however, after adjusting for transaction costs, all ten submarkets were determined weak-form efficient for the period 1970–1984. This was not true for the short horizon holding period, 1970–1975. In four sub-markets an asymmetric version of Alexander's filter rule was able to outperform a buy-and-hold, even for round- trip transaction costs as high as 10%.

Bacterial sialic acid modulates activation of the alternative complement pathway of channel catfish (Ictaluruspunctatus)

Abstract: The alternative complement pathway (ACP) provides the non-immune channel catfish ( Ictalurus punctatus ) with protection against many Gram-negative bacteria. Very little serum bactericidal activity (0–13%) was found against 8 fish pathogens, but a strong bactericidal response (100%) was found against 7 non-pathogens. MgEGTA chelation of catfish serum did not essentially change the bactericidal results. Catfish serum heated at 56°C and serum adsorbed with zymosan had no bactericidal activity. This demonstrated that the ACP was responsible for the bactericidal response. The molecular nature of the microbial surface determines whether or not the ACP will be activated. A relative lack of surface sialic acid has been found to be important for binding complement Factor B of the ACP by susceptible microbial surfaces. This study therefore examined the 15 Gram-negative bacterial fish pathogens and non-pathogens by determining their sialic acid content and their ability to elicit a bactericidal response by the catfish ACP. It was found that there was very little bactericidal activity against the fish pathogens that contained sialic acid but a very strong bactericidal response (100%) against the non-pathogens that lacked sialic acid (p=.0043). A relative lack of sialic acid or no sialic acid therefore correlated with a strong bactericidal response by the catfish ACP. Neuraminidase treatment of the bacterial fish pathogens to remove sialic acid greatly increased the bactericidal response against them by the catfish ACP when compared with untreated bacteria (p=.0431).

Demographic Correlates of Sexual and Dating Attitudes: A Study of Date Rape

Abstract: A probabilistic sample of 449 students from a major university completed the sexual and dating attitudes survey. The responses to the survey questions were compared among the demographic groups of sex, race, age, and religiosity through the use of a test of association and a corresponding test of significance. In addition, two scales were created by examining the attitudinal items through a principal component factor analysis process. The study found that attitudes relating to sex, dating, and date rape are strongly related to gender, with males significantly more likely to hold attitudes condoning aggressive sexual behavior. Implications of these findings were discussed, as were possible solutions to the epidemic level of date rape.

An Evaluation of Progress in the Development of a Definition of Marketing

Abstract: This study evaluates progress in developing a definition of marketing. A survey of marketing educators, managers, scholar-experts and students was conducted to determine elements important in a definition of marketing, a ranking of popular definitions of marketing and an evaluation of the definitions based on relevant criteria. All categories of respondents ranked the 1985 AMA definition of marketing as the definition that best represents the discipline of marketing.

Age of onset, periods of risk, and patterns of progression in drug use among American Indian high school students.

Abstract: A sample of 277 Native American students (grades 7 to 12) was surveyed to examine the age of onset, patterns of progression, and periods of risk for drug use. Results suggest that Native American youth begin smoking cigarettes and marijuana, drinking, sniffing solvents, and using cocaine as early as 10 years of age. The period of risk for initiation of drug use was between the ages of 10 and 13 years. Implications for drug use prevention-education programming are presented.