The crash involvement of interstate drivers in Queensland

Previous research has suggested that driving interstate is more hazardous than driving in one’s home state. However, the increased risk does not appear to be due to greater risk-taking by these drivers, but due to the greater distances they travel, particularly on rural roads, and associated problems such as fatigue. To further examine this issue, an analysis was undertaken of all reported crashes involving interstate drivers that occurred in Queensland between 1993 and 1998. During this period, interstate drivers represented 5% of all drivers involved in fatal and serious injury crashes in Queensland. The analysis indicated that the crashes involving interstate drivers were no more likely to involve factors such as alcohol, speeding, inattention/negligence or inexperience. Rather, the crash involvement patterns of interstate drivers appear to relate more to the type and location of their driving. For example, in Queensland interstate drivers are over-represented in crashes involving: open road driving; driver fatigue; the overturning and sideswiping of vehicles; and weekend travel. Interstate drivers were also more likely to be considered at fault for the crashes they were involved in, compared with local drivers

Comparing Line and HR Executives’ Perceptions of HR Effectiveness: Services, Roles, and Contributions

This study compared HR and line executives’ evaluations of the effectiveness of the HR function in terms of its service delivery, roles, and contributions to the firm. Survey responses from 44 HR and 59 line executives from 14 companies indicated that (a) HR executives consistently rated the functions effectiveness higher than did line executives, and (b) the greatest differences were observed on the more important and/or strategic aspects of HR. Implications are discussed

Measurement Error in Research on Human Resource Decisions and Firm Performance: How Much Error is There and How Does its Influence Effect Size Estimates?

Recent empirical research finds that the relationship between human resource (HR) decisions and firm performance is significant in both statistical and practical terms. However, the typical research design in this area relies upon on a single respondent to validly assess firmwide HR practices. To date, no study has adequately addressed the reliability of such measures, a basic requirement of construct validity. Previous efforts have either defined reliability so narrowly as to miss a major source of measurement error (raters) or have estimated the unreliability due to raters using incorrect methods. In both cases, the result is upwardly biased estimates of reliability. We estimate reliabilities using intraclass correlation and generalizability coefficients. Our reliability estimates suggest substantial measurement error in the types of HR effectiveness and HR practice measures typically used to predict firm performance. We discuss how this degree of measurement influences research and policy implications

A Reading Lesson Observation Framework for Elementary Teachers, Principals, and Literacy Supervisors

Henk et al present a framework which will provide reference points for assessment and help refine instructional practices in reading

Geometric phase for an adiabatically evolving open quantum system

We derive an elegant solution for a two-level system evolving adiabatically under the influence of a driving field with a time-dependent phase, which includes open system effects such as dephasing and spontaneous emission. This solution, which is obtained by working in the representation corresponding to the eigenstates of the time-dependent Hermitian Hamiltonian, enables the dynamic and geometric phases of the evolving density matrix to be separated and relatively easily calculated.Comment: 10 pages, 0 figure

Acute BVDV infection inhibits expression of interferon-stimulated genes during pregnancy recognition in bovine endometrium

Bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) can evade host detection by downregulation of interferon signaling pathways. Infection of cows with noncytopathic (ncp) BVDV can cause early embryonic mortality. Upregulation of type I interferon stimulated genes (ISGs) by blastocyst-secreted interferon tau (IFNT) is a crucial component of the maternal recognition of pregnancy (MRP) in ruminants. This study investigated the potential of acute BVDV infection to disrupt MRP by modulating endometrial ISG expression. Endometrial cells from 10 BVDV-free cows were cultured and treated with 0 or 100 ng/ml IFNT for 24 h in the absence or presence of ncpBVDV infection to yield four treatment groups: CONT, ncpBVDV, IFNT, or ncpBVDV+IFNT. ncpBVDV infection alone only upregulated TRIM56, but reduced mRNA expression of ISG15, MX2, BST2, and the proinflammatory cytokine IL1B. As anticipated, IFNT treatment alone significantly increased expression of all 17 ISGs tested. In contrast to the limited effect of ncpBVDV alone, the virus markedly inhibited IFNT-stimulated expression of 15 ISGs tested (ISG15, HERC5, USP18, DDX58, IFIH1, IFIT1, IFIT3, BST2, MX1, MX2, RSAD2, OAS1Y, SAMD9, GBP4, and PLAC8), together with ISG15 secreted protein. Only TRIM56 and IFI27 expression was unaltered. IL1B expression was reduced by the combined treatment. These results indicate that acute ncpBVDV infection may decrease uterine immunity and lead to MRP failure through inhibition of IFNT-stimulated endometrial ISG production. This in turn could reduce fertility and predispose cows to uterine disease, while evasion of the normal uterine immune response by ncpBVDV may contribute to maintenance and spreading of this economically important disease

Ordered Measurements of Permutationally-Symmetric Qubit Strings

We show that any sequence of measurements on a permutationally-symmetric (pure or mixed) multi-qubit string leaves the unmeasured qubit substring also permutationally-symmetric. In addition, we show that the measurement probabilities for an arbitrary sequence of single-qubit measurements are independent of how many unmeasured qubits have been lost prior to the measurement. Our results are valuable for quantum information processing of indistinguishable particles by post-selection, e.g. in cases where the results of an experiment are discarded conditioned upon the occurrence of a given event such as particle loss. Furthermore, our results are important for the design of adaptive-measurement strategies, e.g. a series of measurements where for each measurement instance, the measurement basis is chosen depending on prior measurement results.Comment: 13 page

Is It Worth It To Win The Talent War? Evaluating the Utility of Performance-Based Pay

While the business press suggests that “winning the talent war,” the attraction and retention of key talent, is increasingly pivotal to organization success, executives often report that their organizations do not fare well on this dimension. We demonstrate how, through integrating turnover and compensation research, the Boudreau and Berger (1985) staffing utility framework can be used by industrial/organizational (I/O) psychologists and other human resource (HR) professionals to address this issue. Employing a step-by-step process that combines organization-specific information about pay and performance with research on the pay-turnover linkage, we estimate the effects of incentive pay on employee separation patterns at various performance levels. We then use the utility framework to evaluate the financial consequences of incentive pay as an employee retention vehicle. The demonstration illustrates the limitations of standard accounting and behavioral cost-based approaches and the importance of considering both the costs and benefits associated with pay-for-performance plans. Our results suggest that traditional accounting or behavioral cost-based approaches, used alone, would have supported rejecting a potentially lucrative pay-for-performance investment. Additionally, our approach should enable HR professionals to use research findings and their own data to estimate the retention patterns and subsequent financial consequences of their existing, and potential, company-specific performance-based pay policies