How Much Do Bank Shocks Affect Investment? Evidence from Matched Bank-Firm Loan Data

We show that supply side financial shocks have a large impact on firms’ investment. We do this by developing a methodology to separate firm credit shocks from loan supply shocks using a vast sample of matched bank-firm lending data. We decompose loan movements in Japan for the period 1990 to 2010 into bank, firm, industry, and common shocks. The high degree of financial institution concentration means that individual banks are large relative to the size of the economy as in Gabaix (2011). As a result, idiosyncratic bank shocks - i.e. movements in bank loan supply net of borrower characteristics and general credit conditions - can have large impacts on aggregate loan supply and investment. We show that these idiosyncratic bank shocks explain 40 percent of aggregate loan and investment fluctuations

Toward a greater understanding of the ways family-based treatment addresses the full range of psychopathology of adolescent anorexia nervosa

Family-based treatment (FBT) for anorexia nervosa (AN) is an empirically supported treatment for this disorder. Derived from several different schools of family therapy, it is a highly focused approach that initially targets weight restoration under parental management at home. However, the view that manualized FBT is solely a behavioral therapy directing parents to refeed their children AN with the single purpose of weight gain is a common but misleading over simplification of the therapy. Indeed, weight restoration is the main goal only in phase 1 of this 3-phase treatment. When practiced with fidelity and skill, FBT's broadest aim is to promote adolescent development without AN thoughts and behaviors interfering and disrupting these normal processes. Although weight restoration is a key starting point in FBT, the entire course of treatment takes into consideration the ongoing impact of starvation, cognitions, emotions, and behaviors on adolescent development. These factors associated with maintaining low weight are viewed in FBT as interfering with the adolescent being able to take up the tasks of adolescence and thus must be overcome before fully turning to those broader adolescent tasks. In addition, FBT recognizes that adolescence takes place in the context of family and community and respects the importance of learning in a home environment both for weight gain as well as related developmental tasks to have a lasting effect. Specifically, in this article we describe how the current FBT manualized approach addresses temperament/personality traits, emotional processing, cognitive content and process, social communication and connections, psychiatric comorbidity, and family factors. This report makes no claim to superiority of FBT compared to other therapies in addressing these broader concerns nor does it add interventions to augment the current manual to improve FBT

Effects of an Expressive Writing Intervention Aimed at Improving Academic Performance by Reducing Test Anxiety

This study examined the effectiveness of a brief, class-wide, expressive writing intervention aimed at improving academic performance and decreasing test anxiety. This study included 110 students from six undergraduate psychology classes. In the first phase of the study, students completed a trait test anxiety measure and a demographic survey. In the second phase of the study, students completed a pre-intervention state test anxiety measure, responded to a 10-minute writing prompt (expressive or neutral), and completed the same state test anxiety measure, and then were administered an in-class exam. Approximately half the students were randomly assigned to the expressive writing group, and asked to write about their concerns and worries regarding the exam; and the other half assigned to the neutral writing group, and asked to write about how they used their time during the past 24 hours. Contrary to some previous studies (Ramirez & Beilock, 2011; Park, Ramirez & Beilock), this study found no significant group differences between the expressive writing group and the neutral writing group in academic performance or change in test anxiety. This expressive writing intervention was found to be ineffective in improving academic performance and at decreasing test anxiety. Interestingly, the strongest predictor of exam performance was previous exam performance, and test anxiety was a very weak predictor of exam performance. Possible reasons for disparate research findings are discussed

Stochastic Filtering

The stochastic filtering has been in general an estimation of indirectly observed states given observed data. This means that one is discussing conditional expected values as being one of the most accurate estimation, given the observations in the context of probability space. In my thesis, I have presented the theory of filtering using two different kind of observation process: the first one is a diffusion process which is discussed in the first chapter, while the third chapter introduces the latter which is a counting process. The majority of the fundamental results of the stochastic filtering is stated in form of interesting equations, such the unnormalized Zakai equation that leads to the Kushner-Stratonovich equation. The latter one which is known also by the normalized Zakai equation or equally by Fujisaki-Kallianpur-Kunita (FKK) equation, shows the divergence between the estimate using a diffusion process and a counting process. I have also introduced an example for the linear gaussian case, which is mainly the concept to build the so-called Kalman-Bucy filter. As the unnormalized and the normalized Zakai equations are in terms of the conditional distribution, a density of these distributions will be developed through these equations and stated by Kushner Theorem. However, Kushner Theorem has a form of a stochastic partial differential equation that needs to be verify in the sense of the existence and uniqueness of its solution, which is covered in the second chapter

La Voz del Pueblo, 01-23-1909

https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/voz_dp_news/1724/thumbnail.jp

Teens understanding of the indicators of the tendency to abuse alcohol: Focus group discussions

Alcohol abuse has become an epidemic in the modern world. The increase in this social problem has brought with it many consequences which everyone in society has to deal with. Unfortunately, the anguish of abuse has also spread through the world of teens. Are there indicators which portend the tendency for teens to abuse alcohol? Quantified research has revealed several of those indicators. Are we helping teens understand what those indicators are? Are teens accepting and learning about those indicators that they might be protected from the harsh consequences? This study begins to help society understand that efforts are being made to educate teens in regard to the indicators of alcohol abuse, though the efforts are diverse and sporadic. This study also finds that teens do not understand what those indicators are